Saudis plan $900b sovereign fund

Dubai: The Saudi Arabian government plans to establish a sovereign wealth fund (SWF) that may exceed $900 billion, which would likely be the largest in the world, the Financial Times reported on Satuday without naming the sources of its information.

The effort is likely to be spearheaded by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which has a mandate to invest only internally, the London-based newspaper said. Earlier, the Saudis’ oil wealth had gone to the Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (Sama) and into the government’s coffers.


“The new fund will be a formidable rival to other government-owned investment funds in the Middle East and Asia, which are playing an increasingly active role in channelling capital to Western companies, particularly those hard hit by the US mortgage meltdown,” it said.

High oil prices have boosted export earnings of the oil-producing countries. “This is what happens when we have massive accumulation of foreign exchange reserves,” Michael Woolfolk, a senior currency strategist at The Bank of New York Mellon in New York, was quoted as saying by Reuters.

Gulf News