Saudi Arabia appoints new investment minister
Riyadh is seeking to increase the amount of foreign capital coming to the kingdom as part of its modernisation plan
Saudi Arabia has replaced Khalid al-Falih as investment minister, at a time when Riyadh is stepping up its efforts to attract increased foreign capital to back Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s ambitious plans to modernise the kingdom.
Falih, who had been in the post since 2020 and is one of the country’s highest-profile cabinet members, is succeeded by Fahad Al-Saif, a former HSBC banker who is head of investment strategy at the Public Investment Fund, as well as the near $1tn sovereign wealth fund’s economic insights division.
The shake-up comes as Riyadh is reassessing its massive spending priorities and scaling back projects as it seeks to manage tightening liquidity and a widening budget deficit, while focusing on hard deadlines as it prepares to host the Expo 2030 trade fair and the 2034 football World Cup.
Since Prince Mohammed launched his plans to transform the kingdom and diversify its oil-dependent economy a decade ago, Riyadh has struggled to attract the levels of foreign direct investment it desired, a task that fell within Falih’s remit.
Riyadh has set a target of attracting $100bn of FDI annually by 2030. In 2024, FDI hit $32bn, up from $25.6bn the previous year, according to government statistics.
Falih, an oil veteran, has long been one of Saudi Arabia’s highest-ranking officials and best-known ministers on the global stage.
He endured a brief fall from grace in 2019, when he was removed from a super-ministry that straddled energy, industry and mining after he had taken a cautious approach to the listing of Saudi Aramco, the state-owned energy company.
But he bounced back the following year when Prince Mohammed appointed him investment minister, and he oversaw a push to convince multinationals to move their regional headquarters to the kingdom.
Under the policy, known as “regional HQ programme”, companies were warned that they risked losing out on lucrative government contracts if they did not shift their regional office to Saudi Arabia. More than 600 firms had since agreed to make the move, Falih said in October.
Falih has now been appointed a minister of state, and continues to be a member of the cabinet, according to the Saudi state news agency, although his exact role is unclear.
Saif has held senior roles at the PIF, which is chaired by Prince Mohammed and has been tasked with spearheading his development plans for the kingdom since 2021.
He has overseen the rollout of the PIF’s debt programme and been involved in formulating the fund’s long-term investment strategy.
Before joining the PIF, he was an adviser to finance minister Mohammed al-Jadaan, and the first chief executive of the kingdom’s National Debt Management Centre.