Saudi wealth fund net profit tumbles 60% in 2024
DUBAI, June 30 (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund's net profit slumped 60% from a year earlier to 25.8 billion riyals ($6.9 billion) in 2024, it reported on Monday, hurt by high interest rates and inflation as well as impairments on some projects.
The Public Investment Fund said in a statement that impairments primarily related to changes to operational plans and increases in budgeted costs.
The fund, which has more than $1 trillion in assets under management, reported net profit of 64.4 billion riyals for 2023 in its consolidated statement on Monday.
Its comprehensive income statement showed that the 138.1 billion riyals reported for 2023 in July last year had swung to a loss of 140 billion riyals this year. A comprehensive income statement includes items such as unrealised gains and losses as well as the change in value of some of a company's assets.
Total assets in 2024 rose 18% to 4.321 trillion riyals from 3.664 trillion riyals a year earlier, the fund said.
The PIF is steering Saudi Arabia's ambitious economic agenda aimed at weaning the Gulf country's economy off oil.
($1 = 3.7502 riyals)
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The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Tuesday briefing: How weakened is Iran after Operation Midnight Hammer – and where might it go from here?
Good morning. The term 'cakeism' – the false belief that one can simultaneously enjoy the benefits of two mutually exclusive choices – may forever be associated with the Brexit negotiations, when keeping the advantages of EU membership while also shedding its costs became the UK's official bargaining position. But the appeal of cakeism endures, and over the last week the US president's approach to the conflict with Iran has started to look distinctly gateau-shaped. Donald Trump wants the glory of a decisive victory on the battlefield but is not so keen on the long-term repercussions that come with it: tit-for-tat retaliations, unforeseeable conflict spillage, focused diplomacy, or even regime change – the kind of talk the Maga movement associates with Trump's predecessors. Questions over the efficacy of the US strikes of Iranian nuclear facilities remain unanswered. And as the regime in Tehran defiantly insists on its own 'victory', insists that trust in the UN nuclear inspectorate is 'broken', and cracks down on dissent at home, it is starting to look as if Trump might not be able to have his cake and eat it after all. For today's newsletter, I spoke to diplomatic editor Patrick Wintour about how weakened Iran really is, and what this could mean for the stability of the ceasefire. Here are the headlines. Welfare | Downing Street's plans to see off a major Labour welfare rebellion were in chaos on Monday night, amid continued brinkmanship between MPs and the government over the scale of the concessions. There was significant division between government departments over how to respond to rebels' demands ahead of the knife-edge vote on Tuesday. UK news | Police have formally opened a criminal investigation into comments made by Bob Vylan and Kneecap at Glastonbury after reviewing video and audio footage of the performances. 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Officers believe the 58-year gap between the crime and the conviction may be the biggest in modern English policing history. On 21 June, the US air force and navy bombed three of Iran's nuclear sites, thus becoming directly involved in a military conflict started when Israel struck key military and nuclear facilities in Iran eight days earlier. Since then, president Donald Trump has been ever more adamant that Iran's nuclear facilities have been 'completely and totally obliterated', and that the ceasefire agreed on 24 June would bring 'tremendous LOVE, PEACE, AND PROSPERITY' to the region in perpetuity. A week on, the ceasefire still holds, but questions over the strikes' long-term consequences are mounting. CNN has reported US intelligence assessments that the bombing did not destroy the core components of the country's nuclear programme. The regime in Tehran, meanwhile, has struck a note of defiance, with Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, claiming his country had 'dealt a severe slap to the face of America' with a missile attack on a US base in nearby Qatar. Which begs the question: did Operation Midnight Hammer weaken Iran's nuclear ambitions, or will it embolden its leadership to pursue them in the long term? How damaged are Iran's military capabilities? The intense fighting between Israel and Iran – now often referred to as the '12-day war' – exposed the Islamic Republic's air defences, showing it was not able to defend itself as effectively against aerial assaults as it has previously claimed. The American strike on the three nuclear facilities – at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan – was undoubtedly effective. 'Most serious analysts think that the damage of the US strikes was very, very serious, and it's hard to imagine that Iran still has a credible nuclear weapons programme in place that has somehow eluded intelligence,' said Patrick Wintour. That is not the same as 'obliteration', however – significantly so. Rafael Grossi, the head of the UN's nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said that while American bombers had 'severely damaged' Iranian facilities, 'one cannot claim that everything has disappeared and there is nothing there', and Tehran could begin weaponising uranium again in 'a matter of months'. 'Even if Iran just has a couple of dozen centrifuges out of tens of thousands left, it could purify its uranium stockpiles within about three months,' said Patrick. 'That's the problem with a military solution and no diplomatic strategy behind it – it would have to be a total wipeout to solve the problem.' Last week, Iran's parliament voted unanimously to suspend all cooperation with the IAEA, and the message that Tehran does not want anyone to have a close look at the wreckage was underlined by a menacing article in an Iranian newspaper, claiming Grossi was an Israeli spy who should be executed. 'They cannot have access to our site,' Iran's UN ambassador Amir-Saeid Iravani said. 'Our assessment is that they have not done their jobs.' Until the nuclear inspectorate is allowed access to what remains of the facilities, Patrick said, 'we are driving blind' – which, at the moment, could actually be not just in Iran's but also Trump's interest. 'Iran wants to have nuclear ambiguity for now', he added. For the US president, meanwhile, the lack of empirical evidence has allowed him to claim an emphatic military victory: 'It has allowed his assessment of the strikes' impact to become harder and harder.' How isolated is Iran diplomatically? In recent months, Iran's foreign minister has invested some effort trying to convey to Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE that Tehran is not some rogue bellicose state but a mature diplomatic player in the region. 'The war has undone that,' said Patrick. 'And that's the case even though those wealthy Gulf states don't publicly support what the US has done, and even bemoan its short sightedness in private.' The 12-day war and its aftermath have also shown up little return for Iran's diplomatic efforts in Europe. Germany's new chancellor, conservative Friedrich Merz, praised Israel's air strikes on the Islamic Republic, saying it was 'doing the dirty work for all of us', and later added there was 'no reason' to criticise America's attack. Britain's prime minister, Keir Starmer, backed the strikes and only warned mildly of a 'risk of escalation' in the Middle East. 'What will trouble Tehran most is that it hasn't managed to leverage the disagreements between Trump and the European Union,' said Patrick. 'The Iranians had hoped that Europe would be much more condemnatory of the strikes.' Is the regime also weakened domestically? In the wake of Operation Midnight Hammer, some Maga acolytes on social media called on the Iranian people to rise up against the regime. Given the social and economic situation in the west Asian republic, this might sound like a realistic demand: unemployment and poverty rates are high, inflation at almost 40%, in part due to the state's self-punishingly high military spending. It was only three years ago that the country saw civil unrest and mass protests against the regime, triggered by the death in police custody of the 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman Mahsa Amini. Yet Israeli and American air strikes, with a reported death toll of more than 900 lives, have also shored up support for the government. 'The regime is trying to galvanise what happened, and there has been a rallying-around-the-flag effect', Patrick said. 'Even critical voices in the diaspora have been mindful of alienating ordinary Iranians.' Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of the last shah who has been one of the leading figures of the pro-democracy movement, has endorsed calls for a civil uprising but has appeared isolated. Instead of pro-democracy marches, Tehran has seen the regime parade the coffins of the 'martyred' military chiefs and nuclear scientists who died in the strikes to state funerals. The regime has also further tightened its grip on civil liberties, turning on alleged traitors from within. 'After the strikes, the Iranian opposition called on the regime to mark a fresh start and release political prisoners', says Patrick. In fact, the opposite happened.' During the 12-day war, six Iranians were executed on alleged charges of collaborating with Israel. 'It is clear that a new wave of intense repression has begun, more severe than ever before', the daughter of one political prisoner told Guardian reporters. Prioritising military over social spending might become a harder political sell in the wake of the war, but then there is only so much political-selling that authoritarian regimes need to do while they have the electorate's hands tied behind their backs. 'In truth, Iran's loathsome regime didn't even come close to falling', said foreign affairs commentator Simon Tisdall in his analysis. What does this mean for the ceasefire? The truce between Israel and Iran is volatile. 'The situation is very unstable, and anything could kick it off,' said Patrick. The list of unpredictable 'anythings' is long: American security agencies have warned of a looming threat of Tehran-backed; US-based 'sleeper cells' could be called in for retaliatory attacks; and Iran's top Shia cleric has issued a fatwa for Trump and Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu to be made to 'regret their words and mistakes'. Analysts are concerned about the lack of a political programme to keep the ceasefire in place. Trump has said he is 'not offering Iran anything', while the Iranian side has claimed that the US president wants to return to negotiations. In an interview with the BBC on Monday, Iran's deputy foreign minister, Majid Takht-Ravanchi, said his country would only be open to such talks if the US were to rule out further strikes during the process. But as long as Trump's intelligence assessment of his victory remains the same, Patrick reckoned there was also considerable pressure to keep the ceasefire in place. 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Reuters
2 hours ago
- Reuters
Indonesian annual inflation at 1.87% in June, just above expectations
JAKARTA, July 1 (Reuters) - Indonesia's annual inflation rate was 1.87% in June, the statistics bureau said on Tuesday, just above market expectations. A Reuters poll of analysts had expected an annual inflation rate of 1.80% in June. Bank Indonesia has a target range of 1.5% to 3.5% for inflation. Core inflation data will be released later on Tuesday. The central bank paused its easing cycle at a policy review last month, but said there was still room to cut rates given moderate inflation and the need to support economic activity.
Reuters
3 hours ago
- Reuters
Morning Bid: Uncertainty dominates ECB forum
A look at the day ahead in European and global markets from Rocky Swift A central bank Who's Who is due to speak in Sintra, Portugal today as policymakers grapple with an uncertain landscape for trade, growth and inflation. Uncertainty was the key theme in opening remarks from European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde on Monday at the ECB's annual forum for central bankers. Lagarde is scheduled to join a panel with central bank heads from the United States, Japan, Britain and South Korea at 1330 GMT. And uncertainty remains over U.S. President Donald Trump's "One, Big, Beautiful Bill," which remains logjammed at the Senate. Trump is desperate to get it passed before America's "Independence Day" on July 4, while deadlines over his "Liberation Day" tariffs loom over trade negotiations. Trump called Japan "spoiled" as a trade deal between the two nations remained elusive, and U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent warned that countries could be notified of sharply higher tariffs. Except for Japan's Nikkei (.N225), opens new tab, equity markets were broadly higher in Asia, with benchmark indexes in South Korea (.KS11), opens new tab and Taiwan (.TWII), opens new tab climbing more than 1.4%. Fresh readings from the Bank of Japan's tankan index and China's Caixin PMI indicated Asia's biggest economies were weathering the tariff storm, at least for now. Euro Stoxx 50 futures pointed to a flat opening, while German DAX futures were up about 0.1%. U.S. stock futures, the S&P 500 e-minis , were down 0.1%. The euro continued its winning days, poised for a record 10th consecutive day of gains against the U.S. dollar, reaching $1.1808, the highest since September 2021. Key developments that could influence markets on Tuesday: - ECB's Sintra conference policy panel - U.S. ISM manufacturing data for June - Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Indexes (PMI) data for France, Germany, and Euro Zone for June - UK house prices for June Trying to keep up with the latest tariff news? Our new daily news digest offers a rundown of the top market-moving headlines impacting global trade. Sign up for Tariff Watch here.
