Board of Changemakers: H.E. Al-Rumayyan, Dalio, Dimon, Fraser, Motsepe and more - #FII7 Day 1

The Apprentice so um welcome to the panel and thank you very much for having us here and we have 11 people on the panel we have 75 minutes so that means everybody gets an hour um for all of you who think you should be on this panel we only have 11 uh we were thinking of having 12 if we had 12 you would be on the panel so just imagine that it you missed it barely but thank you all for coming and I want to thank you for hosting us and let me just uh say

at the very beginning I don't think there's ever been a panel with as big an assemblage of financial talent and skill as you've been able to put together here so thank you for doing this um I'll try to go around alphabetically generally but why don't we start with our host so um Yer uh tell me on AI and I I point out AI is a major subject you're interested in uh I noticed that Saudi Arabia has in both words AI now maybe that's a CO coincidence but uh AI is obviously something you're focused on and

how do you think that you can make Ai and can be made inclusive so that people aren't left behind and are you 100% convinced that AI is going to be a benefit for society as opposed to a detriment thank you um I mean I started um I think back in 2014 but the generative AI which is the new thing and um it requires a lot it requires um the infrastructure which is the uh chips it requires the platforms the data centers uh and all the um uh other uh ABS to work with it I mean

now what we're seeing uh with the um you know chat gbt and the other um AI platforms is just a tip of the is ber this is just the beginning okay so we need to get all the um all the um companies that generates the ABS with the companies that generates the um chips the data centers to work with the governments to have some kind of an accord or some agreement on how to use and harness AI for good MH and to do so we have to be to be more inclusive we cannot just make

the AI as an exclusive thing so you have many models the U uh the closed um model and the open model and we have seen some of the closed um uh model the close source model that is either uh certain ideology or politics plays a lot and there's a big difference between what the internet is today and what AI uh is doing so it has to be a a collaboration countries have to work to have some kind of a strategy or agreements not only countries but I think um supernational organization like the United Nation or

the uh World Bank or some of these big entities they have to work together with different countries on making AI more inclusive so you pointed out in your opening remarks AI consumes a lot of electricity in other words to make AI work it there's a lot of electricity that has to be consumed are you convinced that the um the the effects of all the electrc electricity that's generated all of the climate change that might be affected by AI is worth the benefit in other words is it really going to be beneficial for society to use

as much additional uh electricity uh to get the benefits of AI it is no doubt someone mind I mean generative AI is um the second um phase of AI then we will go maybe to the super AI sometime in the future um so all of this would need huge data centers and that's why we were talking to everyone and we started building so many data centers and the world need more data centers now the problem is to your point the uh power consumption with this data centers and as I said in my opener remarks you

will um just one day of Chad gbt learning is the equivalent of about 26,000 homes in the US which consumes a lot of uh energy so we have to work on um how we can balance you know the bro and cons of the use of uh AI what we doing for instance in Saudi Arabia I think is a good solution we in our in our targets by the year 2030 we want to have 50% of our power uh generation to be based on renewable and the other 50 will be based on gas which emit less

than uh liquid so we have to invest more in the renewable uh energy if you look at the targets by 2040 I think it's 283 trillion dollars needed to be um invested uh cumulatively from the year 20 20 until uh 2040 we haven't achieved much what we have achieved so far as like 1.7 last year or 1.2 trillion so that means we have to pce our investments or deployment by 5 trillion in annual base globally final question at this point um you are the chairman of Saudi ramco which is the largest corporate uh oil producer

in the world you're also the head of pif which is uh one of the largest Sovereign wealth funds in the world as the head of pif you're responsible for producing roughly % of the alternative energy that is supposed to be produced in this in the Kingdom yet you're also producing enormous amount of non-alternative energy at uh at Saudi Arco how do you balance the two every day do you wake up and say I'm going to do a little bit of alternative energy I'm going to do some for carbon energy how do you balance this uh

that's a great question actually what we doing in aramco is should be all the oil and gas companies should really consider doing we are are the lowest emitter when it comes to the oil and gas uh production by far if the other oil and gas companies uh start doing what aramco is doing in their production I think we can reduce the emission by um uh by big numbers I don't remember the exact numbers but it's the equivalent of oneir of the both residential and Commercial em mission in the world so if we can do that

that will be a great thing but the problem the that most of the oil and gas companies have they're not incentivized enough by their governments to to do something like that while in pf we are doing 70% as you said of the renewable uh energy we're trying to balance things and we've working a lot with aramco they're co-investing uh with most of our initiatives in addition to what they're trying to do now in the blue hydrogen and the sequestration which would reduce all the uh emission so I don't see any okay contradiction of what I'm

doing in both entities so as the head of pif do you ever have an experience where somebody comes to you and doesn't tell you they have a great investment idea for you to invest in you ever have that where somebody doesn't give you a great idea when they're talking to you to for you to invest I'm sorry I don't understand the score everybody comes up of course no I do everybody comes everybody comes to us of course with the with the greatest idea on the face of the Earth or history and uh we really inviting

them to do so but we do have a huge process big process on you know filtering all the things looking at the benefits versus the risk we've uh done of course really some great Investments and we're really proud of it um we have less failure Investments which is a good that means our system and framework and governance is working let me turn to Ray Delo Ry um you built the largest hedge fund in the world uh Bridgewater and uh you're also in your new career also an author you've written a number of New York Times

bestselling books in one of your recent books you talked about five forces that are affecting the global economy so can you succinctly tell us how these forces are going to move the economy forward the next couple years or so adversely or positively adversely I'm a fear but positively potentially uh uh yeah as a global macro investor for the last 50 years my job has been to bet on what is going to happen globally macro and uh what I learned in my lifetime is that many of the things that surprised me happened with because they didn't

happen in my lifetime but they happened many times in history particularly the 1935 uh 192 uh 30 to 45 period so these five forces have always interact and I think everything that we're going to talk about today will be related to those five forces and they interact and those five forces of course are the debt money interest rate um economy Force the second is the internal order or disorder force in other words the internal conflicts that we are having today and the debts that we are having today are the largest since the 1930 to 45

period and also you go back in history and you've seen enormous amounts of those they have implications the third great force of course is the international geopolitical force uh two great Powers uh that are rival powers and then of course the uh fact that there isn't a single World Order there isn't a single world power it's very different than in 1945 when the new world order was created because you have a war a dominant power comes out or a dominant powers and they set the rules and everybody goes by the rules well this is a

very different world and so uh those three forces um I wanted to examine those over the last 500 years because to think about Rises and declines of Reserve currencies uh Rises and declines of Empires and so on I needed to get the perspective over that and I discovered that the other two great big forces uh were acts of nature uh which droughts floods and pandemics have killed more people than Wars and is are certainly a dominant Force at this time and then the fifth gr Force has always been man's inventiveness and Technologies so we have

these five forces interacting so everything that we're going to talk about will be related to each one of those and I think if we step back and we put that each one of those in a historic perspective say how are there degrees of influence com compared to those in history the largest wealth gaps since the 1930 to 45 period populism and so on so those are the five forces I think if we're looking at them and their evolution it's like watching a movie play out over and over again if you have that his iCal perspective

and as we're looking at it what we're seeing around the world today as we go into the elections that we're going to see in the United States which are going to be over irreconcilable differences about wealth and power and then we look at the geopolitical situation and then we look at the climate issue the climate issue is going to cost us it's estimated between 5 And1 trillion dollar a year in a world GDP that produces 100 trillion so anyway I think that those five big forces as we look at if we look at historical perspectives

and analogous periods I think that that'll help us I think we have to be concerned about that Dynamic that's taking place put put it simply for next year are you optimistic about the global economy or pessimistic pessimistic pessimistic pessimistic about the look you you have you have a political you have a monetary you have an a a conflict type of environment at the same time you have the greatest inventiveness we talk about this fabulous technology development that has so much potential to um produce wonderful things and then I the also it's a it could be

a problem so if you take the time Horizon the monetary policies that we're going to see and so on will have greater effects on the world and you look at the world gaps so you it's difficult to be optimistic on that and I think now uh the real issue I think is how we deal with each other okay okay if we it was said earlier very well you know um Peace if we can if we can keep a peace if we can have a com a a healthy competitive environment without having a war with each

other we will be in good shape we will make ad adaptations okay Jamie Diamond uh you have led for quite more than a decade the most profitable and lest market cap Bank in the world JP Morgan so are you optimistic about the economy going forward and are you as obsessed as many people are in the financial World about whether the FED is going to increase interest rates again or cut interest rates does it make that much difference to the economy as you see it yeah so David thank you folks thank you for having me here

again and uh I'll give you the optimistic thing I think it's wonderful I've been coming to Saudi Arabia since 2005 and which changed here is so dramatic and so good uh and not just with they've done inside Saudi Arabia but trying to bring peace to the Middle East uh and please in spite of what happened uh in Israel I urge you all to keep up that effort it is the only way to get there with some leadership from Saudi Arabia for all the folks in the Middle East and I'm generally an optimist I think you

you'd be foolish not to look at some of these things taking place today in uh Ukraine Middle East uh obviously my heart goes out for Ukraine uh but also it's affecting oil food uh food prices gas prices migration potential starvation is probably the most serious thing we faced and I hear people talking about ESG all the time I just would put on your table the most serious thing facing mankind is nuclear proliferation if we're not sitting here 100 years from now it will be nuclear proliferation it's not a climate and so uh so I think

when you look at the geopolitical situation as complex as we've seen I I don't know if it's 1948 or 1938 obviously all hope it goes away I think it's a little bit of wishful thinking it's going to take real leadership on the part of many people out there and then I look at the financial situation the fiscal spending which is more than is ever I'm talking about the United States but almost true around the world it's more than it's ever been in peacetime by a long shot with the highest debt levels we ever had by

government and there just kind of omnipotent feeling that central banks and governments can can manage through all this stuff I I I'm cautious I don't think it makes a piece of difference where the rat go up 25 basis points or more like zero nun nada I think whether the whole curve goes up 100 basis points you know I would I be prepared for it I don't know if it's going to happen but I look at what we're seeing today more like the 70s a lot of spending a lot of it's going to be wasted I'm

in favor of this whole uh ESG effort on the other hand if you look at the way we're going about it uh it's almost like governments want to whack them all and force it but no carbon taxes no rational way to go about it that would be more important the United States for example you know you can't build pipelines through to reduce coal emissions you can't build uh you can't build get the permits to build solar and wind and things like that so we we better get our act together I'm hopeful when I listen to

all the R&D see around the world we will make the breakthroughs we need to be climate but it's going to be a day later and longer than it should be because of our own basic uh incompetence I also want to add add one last thing I'm taking it from Bob Gates to fix this it's going to take real leadership from the Western World in particular uh America but leadership which is not just military diplomatic development finance and this development Finance I don't know if AJ is still here what we need in development Finance dwarfs what

governments can do so it it can't be done without private capital and private Capital you know isn't going to come in if they you know you buil something it gets taken from a government something like that so we have a lot of work to do it's one of the reasons I think these events are positive uh but I I would be quite concerned and the other thing about when you look at economics I think people prepare for possibilities and probabilities not calling one course of action since I've never seen anyone call it I want to

point out that central banks 18 months ago were 100% dead wrong okay so maybe there humility about financial forecasting I I would be quite cautious about what might happen next year it's been uh said I think you've commented on this that you would like to be president of the United States if you could be appointed maybe not run for it do you think you're old enough you're only in your mid-60s you think that's old enough to be president United States I I'm still maturing Larry thinkink uh started and still runs the largest asset management firm

in the world called Black Rock uh Larry do you see a tital way shifting to fixed income investments from Equity Investments and do you think that will continue for quite some time or do you think that's really not a tidal wave and people people are basically still investing in equities as much as they did before well again thank you for being here it's always great to be in the Kingdom as Jamie said the transformation of the kingdom in the last seven years is is totally heartwarming um and I would also just want to Echo um

as capitalists as Business Leaders we we all have a responsibility to speak a little louder today in a polarizing World um in a polarizing world where we're seeing terrorism we're watching two Wars and here we are trying to talk about you know how to build make it a better world that's what this fii is about and so we also have to then focus on the unpleasant parts of what's denying the world for better growth so um we all have to be better humanitarians and we all have to be more focused on how to make sure

that the political side of the world uh understands uh that uh peace and prosperity does work a lot longer and uh and does shape and LIF more human beings uh to middle class and higher St standard of living uh and conflicts actually uh uh create much more Global problems for for the majority of the world um we are going to see higher interest rates David we're going to see higher interest rates for longer um this reminds me of the 70s I think some of us were were on trading desk in the 70s um and um

the' 70s was all about bad bad policy today it's about bad policy again um and big macro shifts as Ry spoke about it um the polarization the politization of Supply chains the fragmentation is a big result of it that is inflationary let me over over also say populism is very inflationary because we respond to the immediacy of the moment we don't talk about long-term issues uh uh as we see more and more countries move to the far right we see more um threats towards immigration uh uh the lack of immigration um is very inflationary especially

in economies like the United States I'm talking about legal immigration um and so and then we have um we've had a government I'm talking about the US now that in 2000 we had an $8 trillion deficit and today we have a 33 trillion deficit so the deficit has grown by more than a trillion dollars each year over the last 23 years that is highly inflationary the balance sheet of the Federal Reserve um is highly inflationary and so all these different measures um are much more structural much more difficult so as a result of that interest

rates are going to remain higher opportunities for investors are going to be able to be very patient um you could do nothing and enjoy a positive return all right so are you expecting a hard Landing or a soft Landing in the United States or you just can't project I would I do not we will not see a hard R soft Landing in 20124 um the amount of fiscal stimulus that is just entering the economy which is very inflationary the chips act the IRA and the infrastructure acted about $970 billion the largest piece time non uh

pandemic moment of fiscal stimulus at the same time our Central Bank is trying to arrest the economy and and and so that's that that just hitting the J curve uh and and you see u in labor settlements right now what's going on and labor talk 20 25% increases in wages so I I don't see a problem but I do believe the Federal Reserve is going to have to raise rates higher which probably will mean by 25 we may have a soft we may have a hard Landing that is the only way I see how we're

going to be arresting this but I don't expect it uh anytime soon I think the power of the economy the power of the consumer that Jamie about a lot um is giving me Comfort that the economy is fine obviously other parts of the world the the European economy is is facing much more severe headwinds and the one thing that I would say about the US economy we have a spectacular capital markets we have the greatest Capital markets in the world every country is trying to build their own Capital markets I had many conversation yesterday about

how the kingdom is trying to raise its capital markets in our Capital markets we have the most unique mortgage Market 98% of all mortgages are fixed 30-year fixed so the transmission of high rates in the US economy just takes much longer to impact the economy and so that transmission is not being impacted as fast as the transmission of higher rates in other parts of the world that's in Europe where they have more fiveyear fix and floating especially in the UK you see the transmission of higher rates impacting economies faster so um we you know and

I would just say one last thing intersecting what Yer said intersecting uh uh what a said uh when when you intersect what technology is going to do uh robotics in the intersection of of AI and Robotics we are going to have a boost in productivity and that is going to be the next wave for deflation that is not going to happen anytime in the next few years so I'm more optimistic today than I was four years ago the transformation in medicine how we are shaping lives through diabetic uh therapies that are now showing total impact

on the health of heart disease of diabetes of kidney disease and we you know I know something quite personally to me the medicines for dementia and Alzheimer's is is changing the curve of decline by 50% there are so many reasons to be optimistic and the pages on the newspapers on websites is all about the pessimism and I'm more of a Believer how technology is going to shape these economies and help us out we may have one or two years of struggling but I am powerfully optimistic about how technology is going to be rapidly shape our

world he Jane Frasier is uh running running City the CEO of city and one of the largest banks in the United States and I think the first woman to run a m major Money Center Bank in the United States well we had to go outside the United States to find a woman to do that but you're native of uh of uh Ireland Scotland SC David shame upon you okay so um are you optimistic or you're pessim pessimistic going forward and what's the biggest challenge in running City these days or a major Money Center Bank um

it's it's we're sitting here with the backdrop which I think we all acknowledge of uh the aftermath of the terrorist attack in in Israel and the the events have been unfolding since and it's desperately sad um so it's hard not to be a little pessimistic given that on the other hand we're also as we talk about in a world where um there is a new s in ESG uh which is security be food security energy security it can be defense it can be Financial Security and that's certainly a theme that all the the CEOs around

the world are talking about how to build more resilience countries companies are doing so so from Ci's perspective um as we operate in many different geographies around the world as do many colleagues around the table it's coping with a world where globalization is becoming more fragmented the risks associated with globalization are getting more connected together um and how do we manage and navigate that um and as as Ray said uh you've got a multiple different forces that every company every leader has to navigate so I think it's important to have big ears and thick skin

these days in uh in running any Enterprise so for the women that are watching or that are here um what would you say is the biggest challenge for a woman to rise up in a major Financial Service institution is there any discrimination anymore or is there more than there used to be and what was the secret to your rising up oh well let me just point out quite a OD a remarkable job the kingdom has done on this front I've been coming here not quite as long as Jamie but 15 years and the last four

years have just been spectacular in the change that's happened since coming from coid um it's exciting to see and I think this this country is a good model for how to make sure that there is the education the access to opportunity and it's not token gestures but it's focusing on recruitment it's focusing on development it's focusing on the promotion of women and providing access to Opportunities and I have to say male allies are very important in that Rise um and several of you around the table have been wonderful allies to me okay so Patrice mppi

um Patrice is I think one of the most prominent business people in Africa and very actively involved in philanthropy and business in South Africa Patrice why do does the Western world not really invest that much in Africa relatively speaking uh I think only 1% of private Equity Dollars around the world go to Africa every year uh do you see any change occurring and AFA going to be more attractive to Western investors or do you think it's actually going the opposite way it it's very s simple I mean Africa has to continue to be globally competitive

an exciting destination for investment both domestically and globally uh Investments don't investors worldwide don't have to invest in any specific country or continent there's a lot of exceptional work that has been done in Africa like many other developing countries will there be challenges in the future absolutely yes I mean we we've invested billions of dollars uh in Africa we could have invested in other parts of the world we've invested in India and and in Europe and in America so I think overall there's a there's a new group of young African leaders some of the smartest

brights as African study in America you and I are part of the Harvard University Global advisory Council exceptional Talent Bright Young African study in London and in other parts of the world I think the future looks great and what area would somebody wants to invest in Africa where would you recommend that what type of things Venture Capital buyouts technology what are the areas you think are particularly attractive well I think the key issue is uh you've got to find the right partners and uh and as I said the the the bottom line is the perception

that there isn't any capital in Africa is misf founded uh the financial services company that we are the bigger sh in has got in excess of $80 billion uh I think part of the challenge is we have to diverse we have to invest in other parts of the world but which means me we also have to invest outside Africa which are the best opportunities I think technology is changing the face the opportunities in Africa and in the developing world and and uhu if you look at uh the impact the the the fastest growing economies in

the world are from the continent but of course they start from a low base so uh there's lots of investment in agriculture we will continue in the mining industry uh the the challenge for us now is to beneficiate in the continent and and those beneficiation opportunities have to make commercial sense but overall you know the Partnerships globally and there's a significant amount of Investments that's not just going to Africa but to the rest of the developing World okay so no Quinn is the CEO of HSBC uh a major European bank I think the the the

largest bank one of the largest banks in Europe and that did not take any assistance from the government in ' 0708 so as you wake up every morning are you worried about the European economy or are you more worried about the Chinese economy you have a big presence in China as well so what worries you more the Chinese economy or the European economy well let me talk about the European economy First Look clearly it had a massive inflationary shock with the gas the dependency on the gas price um that then led to a big shift

in some of the demand curve for a number of Industries in Europe anything to do with consumption High Street massive demand curve shift um Europe at the moment is still in terms of real rates is still negative and if you contrast it with the us the real rates in the US are positive so you then got the currency pressure in Europe as well but that demand shift has created a very low growth economy in Europe still with high inflation but coming down and the real shock was the resilience issue the real shock was the dependency

on a single source of energy um and I think if you if you play that into postco all Industries in the world all governments of the world have had that shock on resilience so I seeing a huge amount of diversification of Supply chains taking place um and that is impacting China as well the exports from China are impacted by geopolitics the need for resilience in supply chain and the need for diversification but I think the real challenge for Europe is near-term and probably medium-term growth it will get inflation under control although there is the potential

for a second wave wage inflation is still not under control in Europe and particularly in the UK I think we're all seeing evidence of that biting now in our economies um and I so therefore there is the potential for persistent high high interest rates and high inflation in Europe in the in China I think it's more near-term pressures as they've corrected the economy with some massive policy correction but medium-term I'm still very confident of the growth opportunities in China hindsight is usually 2020 but uh so let's tell us in hindsight was brexit a good thing

for England and a good thing for Europe or not a good thing I'm going to I'm going to I'm going to put a different slant on that um the timing of brexit was very fortunate in that it coincided with coid I think if you look at it from a political point of view Boris Johnson achieved brexit at a time when the economy was already flat and actually the economic impact imp of coid was more damaging than the econom and and actually the economic impact of brexit was muted because it was already a very suppressed economy

so when we run stress tests on the UK economy for brexit on top of coid it didn't make a lot of difference you were already at Rock Bottom what you're now seeing is the emergence of the brexit overhang coming as the economy is rebooting in Europe and the economy rebooting in the UK the UK at the moment if you listen to the Chan the UK is still doing it's low GDP growth it's still better at the moment than Germany or France will it be longterm that's a different matter he uh Steve schwarzman built Blackstone at

the largest uh market cap alternative Investment Company and uh the largest in terms of assets or management market cap and so forth Steve uh a lot of money has come into alternative investments in recent years particularly in Blackstone from retail investors um is that going to continue as the economy maybe slows down a little bit in the United States St or you think retail is a great source of investment capital for alternative investment firms in the future as well well David um there's $80 trillion uh in uh retail investors uh and they're only invested in

our area uh Alternatives maybe 1% maybe two when I started in the alternative business in 1985 institutions at that time had 1% or 2% that was it now they're 25% uh so uh I I think and I've been planning on this since 2010 uh which shows you my timing may be off uh that that there's no reason why retail investors wouldn't want to get the same uh type of positive experience uh that that institutions do uh you Alternatives should be able to generate 500 basis points or more uh than than not using them so why

wouldn't you use them uh so there were some regulatory inhibitions but but now I can tell you uh from talking to the people who run these systems that that they want really dramatic uh increases in Alterna for their customers um institutions are in one way a much more stable uh source of capital uh because they're very disciplined uh they take advantage of dips uh the the retail investor has more volatility sometimes when the world gets gets in a bad position they just don't want to invest so you have to look at the growth uh over

a cycle uh and we're doing like really well uh with this we have uh probably a quarter uh of the trillion dollars we manage that that comes from uh retail uh High net worth investors uh I think that's going to grow as long as you give them a good experience uh and it's also um you have to have very good sales and service it's much more service intensive than than you would think Steve you also have one of the biggest real estate investment operations in in the Western World um many people think that the real

estate world is going to suffer uh decline because interest rates have been high people aren't coming back to work physically so much that maybe people don't need as much office space are you expecting a big decline in the value of commercial real estate in major cities or do you think it's been exaggerated I I think it depends on this sub asset class David so uh Office Buildings um in the United states to some degree also uh around the world because the pandemic people got used to you know staying at home uh and it was actually

more profitable for them to stay at home because one they didn't work as hard regardless of what they tell you uh and the second is they don't spend money to commute uh uh you know they can make their lunch at home uh uh they don't have to buy expensive have closed and so their incomes are are higher so so just um one or two quick statistics uh in the US in the office Market uh buildings are 20% vacant um Unleashed actually there's another 20% that somebody's leased but the people don't come in so you're looking

at office building that basically are 40% unused so I expect when those leases roll off the companies will cut back the amount of space so say you have 30% uh unused space and Office Buildings that means those Office Buildings are not survivable you know as economic entities um now that the exception is office buildings that are 10 years old or less people like being in those so that's going to have a very bad ending on the other hand there are other categories uh of real estate like warehouses they're still going up you know like 8

% a year in terms of leases when somebody rolls off an old lease they've gone up so much there's an increase to them of 50 to 60% so there are a variety of of areas whether it's student housing whether it's actually even affordable housing all kinds of commercial real estate are doing very well uh and so the broad brush that people paint with commercial real estate which basically because Office Buildings are very tall you can see them uh and that's sort of your vision uh so you're going to have a mixed outcome Jamie you asked

your employees that are told all your employees to come back to work 5 days a week are they doing that 60% 5 days a week 30% 3 days a week I mean three days a week mandatory we track it and it includes coming in on Friday 10% have always been working from home if it makes sense 100% of our MDS required to go to work every day I don't think you can lead people and work from home okay Neil Shan Neil built the biggest uh most successful Venture Capital business in China under the Sequoia China

name now he has his own company um so is it easy as it was 10 years ago to invest in China and uh do you think it's going to be more complicated for Western investors to invest in China in the near future well it never been easy invest in China you made it look easy you you you you you have to work very hard because there two thing there one that you know there's a lot of competitions if you're looking at the you know the work ethics right people talk about 996 9:00 a.m. to 9

p.m in and six days a week uh I think that's prior to many of those uh you know startup companies and also to large companies and the competition is fierce so in order for you to uh creating strong return you really have to uh you know find a way to position yourself to provide in value and you work need to work as hard as your CEOs the second point I want to make is that you need to take a long-term views and uh this you know obviously country just like many others you're seeing the Economic

and Business Cycles up and downs and the very important thing is to obviously take a longterm view uh you know luckily venture capital and gross capital and private equity which will uh been participating has been a you know long tail asset but you know when you make an investment take a longer term view uh from the macro perspective as well on the macro perspective and and able to uh you know stick around and even some of those business might go in up and downs I think that's probably the most important so uh let me ask

you uh today uh you an early investor in bite dance which owns Tik Tock is Tik Tock going to ruin Western Society As We Know It uh many people think that Tik Tok is going to destroy our youth and so forth why are you're not worried about Tik Tock destroying Society well clearly there are a lot of uh I think you know you know uh issues uh those companies have to address not just uh uh you know Tik to I in general when those company become you know National Champion China when they go to uh

overseas countries uh they need to obviously work in with the local partners and make sure that they accepted uh you know locally uh as uh obviously uh very very uh good citizen and it's it's it's a you know process that I have seen you know you know like you mentioned the Tik Tok has been gone through this and and you know and obviously learn how to work in with you know the partners in the US and partners in Europe and in Middle East for example and and to uh to uh to really you know contribute

to the ecosystem not just being you know 100% commercially the US China relationship is not in great shape some people might say um does that affect your ability to operate in China or it doesn't make much difference I you know like I said I think you know take a longterm View and obviously uh and you know focus on the entrepreneurs uh because at the end of the day uh you know entrepreneurs well you know helping you to create you know uh value and you have to trust them that they able to navigate all the different

regulatory uh challenges hey David Solomon is the CEO of Goldman Sachs uh an iconic and one of the largest investment banks in the world and Commercial Bank as well so David the m&a business has been down a bit the last year or so is that because of interest rates or why do you think that is and you see the the m&a world coming back at some point and you headed the investment banking part of Goldman before you became CEO so you know this business pretty well you know m&a m&a David is a function of confidence

and so if you listen to the dialogue today uh i' say there's great uncertainty um and people always try to frame things you ask the question very clearly you know are you optimistic are you pessimistic you know long term I'm certainly optimist IC but I'm uncertain right now and if you're a CEO and you're uncertain you tend to be cautious about doing significant things uh that change the trajectory of your business and bring outside you know factors into your business you know over time scale matters enormously in the competitive nature of global businesses and so

m&a activity can EB and flow but as people become more certain in the environment they have to move forward and continue consolidation and scale to compete effectively you know we've seen you we've seen in the energy space over the course of the last couple weeks couple very significant deals to create more scale more consolidation um I think we had a an a level of extreme confidence uh as we were coming out of the pandemic because of all the fiscal stimulus because of how free money was and so you saw an extraordinary boom in m&a activity

very significant portion of it was driven by Financial sponsors and private Equity Capital that's all now reset and so you know my strong view is m&a activity over reasonable periods of time decades grows in parallel with economic growth and market cap expansion will continue on that journey and you'll see a pick up in strategic m&a a few years ago maybe 10 years ago or so it seemed like half the classes at Harvard Yale Princeton Stanford other really good schools wanted to go to Goldman Sachs right out of college is that still the case people still

rushing in how many employees do you have coming in or prospective employees every year and do can you take all these people or is it gone down and people now want to go into Tech startups or public service or something well there's a lot of competition for good people in the world you know Goldman Sachs uh feels very good about where it it'ss competitively to attract people we had 265,000 applications for 2600 analyst jobs out of University and we had over a million people apply for positions at Goldman Sachs last year we have 45,000 employees

at Goldman Sachs so it's certainly a very interesting compelling place for people to come learn meet other people grow gain experience a small portion of them stay and build their careers in our organization that's the way it's always been most of them go out into the world and you know wind up at events like this or running businesses doing all sorts of interesting things so we have we have a compelling I think human capital ecosystem I think all businesses like ours All Professional Services businesses have to have a very compelling competitive ecosystem for talent talent

is so important in all the businesses around the table if you don't find your own way of having that compelling ecosystem if you don't give people good experience good education good mentorship good Economic Opportunity an ability to meet and network with people that they want to be around it makes it much more challenging over time to run a good business okay and let me ask you another question you asked your employees to come back or maybe told your employees to come back are they coming back and they're actually physically in the office now we we

are our business is by and large operating the same way now on a global basis the same way now as it did before the pandemic I would say in the United States on Fridays there's a slight difference versus what there was before the pandemic but we're pretty close and i' you know I'd also amplify that we run a big Global business we operate in 50 countries you know outside of the United States there's a lot less discussion about this issue than there is inside the United States but for our organization we have encouraged and I

think people have realized they want to be together 50% of the people who work at Goldman Sachs are in their 20s um when you're in your 20s you want to be with other people uh learning growing experiencing so we've managed to get our organization we think to a very good place okay uh Shamara I guess you're used to being last because W is uh probably at the end of the alphabet is at the back end of the alphabet probably not the first time that you've been the last but uh you're obviously uh very successful in

the business world for those who don't know she's the CEO of mcari which is a very large Australian based bank and probably the leader in um investing in in uh infrastructure related kinds of projects so is infrastructure investing now being affected by artificial intelligence by ESG and are you as active in that area as you were before and is it as profitable as it was before yeah well I mean if I could just start by saying um infrastructure investment we've been investing now for 30 years trying to develop this as a separate asset class and

we still see it as being in its first Innings because um to the point Steve was making about representation in people's portfolios out of this sort more than 100 Trill of managed Assets in the world it's grown to being only 1.2% at this point and while there is scope for other asset classes to go we think there's reasons this one should so we view the whole world as an emerging market for infrastructure investing and we think that's both from the point of view of the savers whose money gets allocated through their portfolios that it has

a good liability match to those sort of savings it gives good diversification in terms of correlation to hedge funds public Investments other Alternatives um and also in times of rising rates it gives some resilience because the revenue line is impacted by that so we think in investors world there's scope for more to be allocated but we also think much more importantly in the communities where we invest infrastructure investment does Drive improved living standards and prosperity and hopefully we'll go some way then to reducing the instability in the world RJ was talking about dealing with uh

poverty as well as livable planet and so that's why we are passionate about trying to drive more investment in this area and in terms of um recent developments now our population has gone from about 1.8 billion where it was for 20,000 years just in the last year has rocketed to 8 billion people on this planet and going to 10 and that's driving the need for way way more investment in this class you talked about Ai and ESG but um if I could talk about four buckets of where we invest as examples um energy and utilities

is a very basic one and I know there's work done by the Rockefeller Foundation saying access to Reliable energy is the biggest driver of improving living standards in the world and um today um world Bank data says that 1.1 billion people don't have access to any and more worryingly half of those don't have access to clean water so huge investment needed in Utilities in infrastructure around the world to lift people's living standards also if I could talk about Transportation infrastructure another really basic area where communities need this investment um it gives people access to higher

paying jobs if they can travel it drives more connectivity um and also even in the developed world you know as the populations get bigger we need to trade more and special ized Seaborn trade needs to pick up so we need a lot more investment in the development and developing World in digital infrastru in transport infrastructure and then I was just moving to digital where not just AI it's the latest manifestation in what human beings have amazingly in my 30-year working life done with technology it just blows my mind and we now um have much more

um ability to deliver remote areas education healthc care digitally so um fiber optic networks Towers data centers that his Excellency was talking about all need investment and the the last one when you talked about ESG is climate change response where and you were going to ask me a question so I'll stop there well I ask you for those people here who haven't been to Australia why should somebody want to invest in Australia is it a good place in which to invest um generally what what is the advantage of investing there and related to that uh

us the the Australia China relationship has been complicated lately has that affected your bank in any way um yeah well first of all in terms of investment in Australia we actually have really good foreign direct investment and I was going to say in infrastructure just to finish on that RJ was saying there's a lot of private Capital wanting to invest the big challenge is investable opportunities and drisking them and the reason Australia does attract a lot of investment is because there is a reliable climate there to invest so huge energy companies transport companies coming to

invest and similar to What's Happening Here in the Kingdom setting a Glide path for private Capital setting up regulatory Frameworks Etc um but more importantly the Deep expertise of the private sector to Dr risk so um Australia is attracting a lot of investment Australia like a lot of countries now sits in the situation where the geopolitical tensal is increasing between China and the US and I guess um you know I've heard African leaders say this they want to deal with everyone in the world and we had people talking to the importance of peace and Harmony

in the world ideally we want to engage with everyone Australia has a very strong alliance with the us but also with China we're really working hard to improve relationships as a country um so for mcari as a bank um our business is very domestically Australian in what we do in banking but in terms of infrastructure investment all of these regions are important and attractive to us so yes we want to invest in the veloped world but China we do a lot in data centers in renewable energy did mcari have a lot of women CEOs before

you but we had six people and they were all male so um so far I like Jane I'm batting first so yes sir um you are involved with the building of a major city in Saudi Arabia neom which I guess is going to have uh going to be really the wave of the future not going to have carbon I guess it's going to be all Electric in many ways uh how what's the progress of that and is it costing more than you thought and why should somebody want to invest in that project if they were

having some spare Capital to invest in Saudi Arabia um so it took us um few years in doing the planning because this is a really long-term um project um we have it in faes uh the first phase should be between 2027 and 28 and hopefully we will um get at least 300 ,000 people residing over there um and then the other phases will be in the 2030 and mid-30s and then 2040 and 2045 the um aspirations and the Ambitions that we have is to have somewhere between 7 to 9 Mill million people reside in there

this is a huge line about 100 74 kilm as you said it's um the carbon footprint there should be zero and we're not talking about Net Zero no it is zero everything that we're using over there is uh based on renewable energy all the infrastructure going to be underground trains and other vehicles the um the challenge that we have is how to um use the mobility vertically and horizontally with the least amount of time to um go from point A to point uh B so we started the I mean now even if you fly over

uh neom you can see the line at the infrastructure so we started with um with the infrastructure there and uh it is closely monitored by the uh chairman of our board for and the chairman of neom who's the crown Brands he has um almost um monthly or bi-weekly board meetings just to follow up on what we're doing but neom is bigger than the line neom has 16 different sectors and has seven main Regional um projects one of them is um oxagen which is the first industrial city in the world that is based all in uh

renewable so you've go ahead I'm sorry you've been involved a fair bit I think it's fair to say in the golf world golf um by hanging out with a lot of famous golfers have your has your own golf game improved your handicap gone down or it's getting worse by the day on S you get all kind of TPS from them you can hasn't gotten better all right so uh we haven't talked about uh some ongoing Wars that are now uh unfortunately in facing the world uh does anybody want to comment on whether this is going

to affect the global economy or your investment outlook for the world Larry or or Jamie or Steve and anybody want to talk Ray anybody whether what we see now in in uh Gaza what we see in Ukraine is that affecting your outlook on the global economy and and your willing willingness to invest in certain areas Larry I would I would start off saying we don't know the duration of the the conflicts obviously um I'm in most of my travels in the last three two weeks um the word Ukraine was never uttered um obviously that we

need to talk about that um obviously the situation in Gaza and Israel um we're watching it we're reading about it immediately today every day I wake up to read what's going on and talk to my team Jamie there's no question it if these things are not resolved um it probably means more Global terrorism which means more insecurity which means more Society is going to be fearful less hope and when there's less hope um we see contractions in our economies and so I think um there is consequences to War uh and to fear and instability and

I think it will lead to less hope and a lot more fear and it will then lead to much greater contraction if we don't navigate this as a world and that's why I think we all have that responsibility to talk about it and to try to do something about it Jane or or Jamie or Steve Steve yeah after um the 73 War you had a recession uh so um you know history doesn't always repeat exactly uh the way uh you know you'd think um but but but it doesn't help uh global economy one thing I

wanted to add just sort of slightly off point about inflation because that's been a big topic and overlay um you know we we have about 250 companies that we own with 750,000 people uh and um we're seeing a different picture uh than is reflected here um uh uh the input costs in our company uh companies you know that that's what it cost to make stuff uh in in in the third quarter um were zero increase and that runs counter to this hot inflation uh and we're seeing with the FED um our Revenue growth has gone

from 133% in the first um uh uh in the second quarter to 8% growth still growing but that's a pretty big decline uh in a quarter but but the profits are up 16% so the only way you get that it with with decreasing rates of sales is it's not costing you as much to Manu manufacture things um so so that that tells me also uh a year ago we were companies were growing people 10% now they're growing people zero so it says to me that that the FED is actually having pretty good impact in terms

of taking inflation uh out of the system uh and a third rough of the CPI uh is in shelter a year ago that was running 12 133% now it's roughly around 1% but the FED doesn't measure it that way they average the high numbers with where you are now so if you put that together you at least the way we see it you you're really having much lower uh inflation than some of the numbers that are being uh reported okay so anything anybody else want to comment on the wars ongoing what's impact your assessment if

if not let me go we have about 7 minutes left let me just go around everybody if you could just say what makes you optimistic about the future in one or two words is there anything that makes you optimistic about the future uh why don't we start here um I mean again um I would give the same answer that I gave uh um last year um we have a plan we have uh objectives and we have um uh like political will right proposition and right people to execute so I'm very much um optimistic in the

future and I discussed um U this before with Ray um he had some pessimistic views and uh me and some others we had some positive optimistic views and we discussed why we had um different views because we're both very informed and educated about uh certain numbers and stats and economic events I think the the reason why you will be pessimist or Optimist is if you are passive investor or an active investor and the difference between the two if you're going to the financial markets only that's a passive investment because you really cannot change what you're

investing in but if you're going into um establishing things Green Field projects building uh data centers building cities building things of that nature you are an active investor and you can work especially for for me personally as the governor of PF working with the government investing uh the monies of the government of the country we can put the whole ecosystem to work in our advantage so I am uh very much Optimist Larry optimistic what makes you optimistic I I think um as a species we solve problems okay um so I think um over a long

history of humanity we saw problems we may have a lot of short-term problems we may have issues but um I I would continue to be heavily long-term invested over a long cycle okay Shane the average worker today spends 80% of their time processing and 20% on content AI will turn that on its head 8020 will go the other way that is a great enrichment of human lives hey Jamie what makes you optimistic I think we've already mentioned the enormous progress Saudi Arabia has made but if you go around the world that was true for Ireland

years ago South Korea uh several other countries and other countries got the wrong way so technology I think the R&D the brain power of both investors and and is extraordinary uh it's it's not a given I I think that this is a very complex world it's getting more complex and it's quite dangerous Steve David I look at um you know sort of the future a bit with all the factors from this amazing panel frankly it's just a privilege to be here but but I also look at it from a cycal point of view I've been

through six of these Cycles in my career and and now we're coming off the top and and we're starting to go down so that would say to me that next year perhaps is not so wonderful uh but then you'll hit your bottom and and then you know we'll go up again and and and given all the positive things people talking about the trend is up uh but we're living in a post pandemic world and that's what's Driven the spending after um uh you know sort of the pandemic which led to the inflation which LEDs leads

to the higher rates which then LEDs to the central banks sort of trying to kill that and and then we'll go up again after that okay the trees what makes you optimistic I mean this world has got a lot of exceptional people and I mean people are on this table and various others truly uh committed passionate to make the world a better place the youth in the developing World throughout the world and also human creativity technology and and yes sir Saudi is doing exceptional work not just in Saudi but in the developing world and in

Africa and you know lots of good people committed to a better world Shamar what makes you optimistic um same as Larry and Patrice I really believe in humanity and our ability to extend our lifespans the quality of Our Lives um we solved coid and we've come out with incredible technology now for virtual communication so I think we just have to put our heads down the privileged people in this room and get on with delivering the solutions what makes you optimistic yeah I'm I'm uh optimistic because the younger Generations uh and and I think they are

the future of the E economic growth and you know every single time when I spend time with the young CEOs young entrepreneurs are coming back with a more conviction for the future and what we need to do is give give them support capital and on top of that uh mentorship and obviously the growth of the world will driven by large companies but also be driven bymes and try to disrupt those Industries and also I think you know giving the younger generation hope that they can creating social Mobility which is also very important right no um

I think there's going to be two or three breakthrough Technologies in healthcare that will change people's lives dramatically and I think there'll be a couple of breakthrough technology in other Industries um and I think 20 30 years from now we'll look back and say those two or three or four or five things change the world I'm negative on one thing I'm I'm going to give you a negative not just an optimistic I am I am concerned about a Tipping Point on fiscal deficits all right um I think it won't come gradually it when it comes

it will come fast and I think there are a number of economies in the world where there could be a Tipping Point and it will hit hard minute to go optimistic what makes you optimistic uh his Excellency said it very well um I there there is um deals that are going on and there's an entrepreneurship that is phenomenal so the there are more deals that can be made in order to make more change we're seeing this happen all around in all dimensions and the entrepreneurship that is happening is is fantastic I mean the magic formula

is find the most talented inventive people and provide them with the capital and ability to do that now that changed is very much by location okay so I when you ask me to deal with the world as a whole it's a different thing one of the reasons that I think this place is so exciting is because it's a talent magnet for bring for bringing people like this together to be able to do this entrepreneurship I think you'll see Renaissance States in other words the neutral countries and there are just three basic things you need to

do you need to earn more than you spend have a good income statement of balance sheet you need to compete well but not fight internally and you need to stay out of a World War those places who do that which do that and do this Innovation I think are going to have a wonderful time in history there were the well I'll just leave it at that all right David optimistic uh optimistic always but i' I'd agree with what what what jimie said it's not a given but I'd point to three simple things that have been

said in a number of ways advancements in science advancements in technology and the optimism and resiliency of the human spirit all right well um this has been a very exciting interesting panel how many of you have been able to convince your children that what you do is so interesting they want to do the same thing you're doing anybody nobody okay all right G I want to thank you for assembling everything and thank Richard for putting together thank you very much well done d