nonthaburi

Am I the only one who thinks this plan is a tad over ambitious considering the state of the economy.

$500bn is a lot of cash. Is the sale of Aramco shares supposed to finance all of this.

As a Saudi colleague said to me earlier, when do I get to eat a part of this cake?

scrubbedexpat141

Being run by the PIF, which if recent events are to be true, have been preparing themselves to throw a vast amount of money at people to come and build what they want.

weasel decentral

I really hope this kicks off in a big way rather than a piecemeal drip feed of works, there are so many shitty contractors and shitty contractor's staff clogging up the industry and killing the rates for everyone.

One big mega project to suck them all in and I can't think of a better location than KSA

DXBtoDOH

So....

Scratching me head here for a moment.

What exactly is the function of the new city?

What will it do? What will it produce? What will it generate? Who is it for?

What is the point of its existence?

TheShed

Its certainly not going to be funded by the IPO. Aramco is only floating 5% of the company and Saudi's internal valuation of $2tn is looking over ambitious so I doubt the IPO would produce more that $100bn absolute tops.

scrubbedexpat141

As it potentially falls under slightly new or different jurisdiction maybe it will have zones for tourism or fun or drinking or ....?

weasel decentral

Ostensibly I'm guessing the alarm bells ringing for having one source of income only are ringing loudly in KSA, even selling part of the family jewels like Aramco will not help. This seems to be a 'if we build it they will come' attempt for attracting and creating a new business hub.

I'm sure there has been huge pressure from the SBG, Oger and a few others to kick some life back into the construction industry also.

Edit to say; will be interesting to see full disclosure of proven reserves under the Aramco IPO