Richest man

Chapter 26 Asia: Al Waleed bin Talal (1)
——Alwaleed bin Talal: A luxurious prince living in the desert, one of the few people in the world who can write a check for billions of dollars

Saudi Arabia seems to be the most Arab country in the world, including its wealth holders. On the list of the richest heads of state selected by Forbes in 2004, the 81-year-old King and Prime Minister of Saudi Arabia, Fahd bin Abdul-Aziz, topped the list with a personal fortune of US$250 billion.

Fahd bin Abdul-Aziz, 81, may not be happy about his own wealth, but one of the royal family members - Alwaleed bin Talal, his relative The nephew, the child of one of his 23 brothers, ranked fifth in the 2005 "Forbes" list of the world's richest people, and his assets of 237 billion US dollars also made him the richest man in the Middle East.

What the king should be happy about is not just the wealth itself, but that Alwaleed bin Talal did not become a vampire for the entire royal family like the other 5000 princes in this country who became rich by pouring oil. He started his business with US$1.5 funded by his father, and with his extraordinary investment acumen, he earned the huge family fortune he is today.

Alwaleed bin Talal's exaggerated use of money is astonishing. It is said that he is one of the few people in the world who can write checks worth hundreds of millions of dollars. In August 2002, to celebrate the completion of another new luxury hotel owned by him, Alwaleed held a grand concert in Sharm El Sheikh, a famous tourist resort at the southernmost tip of the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt. No more than 8 people attended the concert, including 140 singers from 14 Arab countries. They were all picked up by the prince from various Arab countries by special plane.These singers didn't know what gift the prince would give them before they came to the concert, or they didn't think about the gift at all-because they all had "business relationships" with the prince, and they were often in the prince's place. Appearances on owned TV channels.At the end of the concert, the gift that the prince gave to the 76 Arab singers who attended the concert turned out to be a world-renowned BMW car.

Another time, Al Walid, known as the "IT Pioneer in the Arab World", ordered 200 Motorola mobile phones for himself, his family, relatives and friends-eventually gave away 700 mobile phones-he didn't care whether others would like it or not This newly launched mobile phone.

Interestingly, however, his exaggerated behavior may not be accepted by everyone. In 2001, when the prince, who seemed a bit arrogant due to pride, arrogantly handed over a check of up to 911 million US dollars to the New York authorities after the 1000/[-] incident, he was declined on the spot by then mayor Giuliani because In the name of charitable donations, the prince took the opportunity to pressure the US government to support the establishment of a Palestinian state - an idea that, ironically, is now being considered by the Bush administration.

What kind of person is Alwaleed bin Talal? Is he really the legendary "Buffett of the Middle East?" what is ziz's life like for a prince expelled from saudi arabia

The Saudi prince who started with $1.5
Alwaleed bin Talal, born in 1957, is the son of the 21st prince of the founding monarch of Saudi Arabia.His father was the ambassador of Saudi Arabia to France, and his mother was the daughter of the first prime minister of Lebanon after independence.

When Alwaleed bin Talal was 5 years old, his father fell out with the king of Saudi Arabia and other members of the royal family because of his sympathy for Nasser, who later became the president of Egypt, and was exiled to Egypt.There, he spent his life with his father and family.Although Alwaleed and his father were later allowed to return to Saudi Arabia, since then his father himself and his descendants have lost forever the opportunity to enter the top political circles of Saudi Arabia.

In 1976, at the age of 19, Alwaleed left his hometown to study for a master's degree in business administration at Monroe College in San Francisco.It is said that hundreds of rich children from Saudi Arabia went to study in the United States at that time, but when it comes to concentration and hard work, no one can compare with Alwaleed.

“I don’t see anyone working as hard as he does,” said Carlos Alwaleed, a humanities professor who once taught Alwaleed. “His grades were the best in his class.”

In 1979, Al Waleed returned to his home country with straight A's.The $1.5 funded by his father became his first venture capital.At that time, Saudi Arabia had just begun to harvest a large amount of "petrodollars" in the international oil market, and commercial activities in Saudi Arabia were also becoming increasingly active.Using his connections and modest capital, Alwaleed started a trade agency and contracting business, and during those years his annual profits reached tens of millions of dollars.At that time, many members of the Saudi Arabian royal family used their identities and connections to make easy money by acting as agents for foreign companies, but Alwaleed was different from them. He chose another way to accumulate wealth. With the accumulated capital, several companies were successively established and joint ventures were created in Saudi Arabia with foreign companies.Next, Alwaleed foresaw that the high welfare policy implemented by the government relying on petrodollars would greatly stimulate the domestic real estate market, and promptly bought two large pieces of real estate in the capital Riyadh.These lands became the beginning of his journey to real estate. Today, he has become the largest private real estate owner in the capital of Saudi Arabia.

In 1986, successive successes pushed Alwaleed to extend his tentacles into the financial world. In this year, he suddenly announced that he had become the largest shareholder of the United Bank of Saudi Arabia, which had been losing money for years.Under his careful management, by 1989, United Bank had become the most profitable commercial bank in Saudi Arabia.

After being baptized in the domestic financial market, Alwaleed set his sights on a broader international market. In 1991, he spent US$8 million to support Citibank, which was in crisis. 1994/3.5 of the shares of Euro Disneyland, and successively became the main controlling shareholder of several hotel chains in Canada, the United States and Europe. In October 1, as stock exchanges around the world from Hong Kong to New York plummeted, Alwaleed ordered $4 billion to buy shares in a slew of megacorporations.

In the new century, Alwaleed became more fond of American companies. In mid-May 2000, he announced that he would invest US$5 billion in 15 American companies, of which 10 were related to the Internet, 6 were large telecom companies, and 2 were well-known companies. .

The richest man in the Middle East who is good at investing is also interested in investing in Internet and IT stocks. In April 2000, he told the media that in the past six months, he and his company spent US$4 billion to buy a large number of technology stocks, of which US$10 million was bought in AOL stock.

Alwaleed, with the "royal holding company" as his base camp, has spent huge sums of money to acquire the stocks of internationally renowned companies for more than 20 years.His shares cover banking, telecommunications, Internet, media, entertainment, hotels, construction, petroleum, agriculture, catering, high-end fashion, retail, supermarkets, tourism, transportation, automobile manufacturing and other fields. Companies with his shares include Citibank, News Corporation, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, McDonald's, Disney, Apple, Motorola, AOL-Time Warner, Ford, Amazon, eBay, Kodak, Xerox and a series of internationally renowned companies.In addition, he also owns or operates 274 hotels around the world, including Merwin Pickle Hotel in Switzerland, Four Seasons Hotel in London, Fairmont Hotel in the United States, Disney Hotel in Paris and many other internationally renowned hotels.

Just when the whole world is attracted by the largest non-American investor, he is far away from the United States and lives in the desert near Riyadh like an ancient city buried in ancient sand in the Arabian desert.In this desert, he built a palace with 1.3 million US dollars. The gate of this palace can only be opened after the gatekeeper utters a code word similar to "open sesame" in Arabic.The palace has [-] rooms, equipped with [-] TV sets, [-] telephones, [-] elevators, and several swimming pools.Alwaleed, his third wife and two children live in this palace, and there are [-] servants for them, all of whom are equipped with walkie-talkies.

A modern tent in the palace is his studio, and there are three large TV screens in the tent. These screens are connected to mobile phones, fax machines, printers, computers and a truck with a value of 70 US dollars. The communication equipment is connected to the satellite, and 20 managers manage his wealth through these equipment. These people are busy day and night, reporting to him the stock market situation, investment opportunities and company performance at any time.

Many people commented that Alwaleed's history of getting rich can completely write a modern version of "Arabian Nights"-he is the mysterious person who appears in those stories.

They call me "Saudi Buffett"

In the field of investment, Buffett and Alwaleed are the two myths of the West and the East.As the second richest man in the world, Buffett has created amazing wealth. When Bill Gates visited China in 2003, Jiang Zemin, then President of the country, asked him about the situation of the US capital market. Gates' answer was: only one person really understands the mystery - Warren Buffett.The 2004-year-old man, who was second only to Bill Gates in the 429 "Forbes" list of the world's richest people with a net worth of US$71 billion, admires Al Waleed from the bottom of his heart.

In a letter to Alwaleed, Warren Buffett wrote: "In Omaha, I am honored to be called 'America's Alwaleed.'"

There is another similarity between the two people. Warren Buffett earned his first pot of gold after graduating from university at the age of 22 - $1.5. Since then, he has devoted himself to the sea of ​​stocks and created a wealth miracle; Only $[-].

Only buy stocks in crisis

Alwaleed, who started off with $1.5 backed by his father, has a major advantage as a private investor because he has access to large sums of money at any time.If a company runs into a crisis of insufficient funds, the prince can easily write a check for hundreds of millions of dollars.As a big investor, he also has access to managers and bargaining power that ordinary investors dream of—the contracts signed in private that are beneficial to both parties bring him returns that exceed what ordinary investors can get.

(End of this chapter)