MUST-READS

• Can Saudi Arabia’s Oil Sustain Its Dominance Amid Global Push for Renewables?

  Saudi Arabia aims to solidify its position as the world’s top oil supplier, with Aramco planning to boost production. The state-owned giant will increase output to 13 million barrels daily by 2030 to meet rising global demand. On March 18, 2025, Aramco outlined its production target as part of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, a strategy to diversify the economy and reduce dependence on oil revenues. Analysts highlight how Aramco’s move aligns with growing global tensions and demand, which push oil prices higher. Alongside Aramco, other major Saudi companies like Sabic, Rabigh Refining, and Petrochemicals advance projects that align with the country’s energy goals. These companies focus on developing technologies to boost efficiency and sustainability.

• GCC economic growth to rise to 4 percent in 2025 despite trade headwinds: ICAEW

  In an environment of rising protectionism and persistent geopolitical tensions, the GCC region will remain resilient and is expected to register a GDP growth of 4 percent this year, broadly in line with the consensus and up from an estimated 1.8 percent in 2024. The strong growth in 2025 will be supported by an increase in oil production starting in April, which was confirmed by OPEC+ members recently. However, the global economy’s outlook remains uncertain. The ICAEW recently cut its 2025 world GDP growth forecast by 0.2ppts to 2.6 percent. In the Middle East, GDP is expected to grow slower at 3.3 percent in 2025 amid uncertainty over external demand despite the region being out of President Trump’s direct tariff firing line.

• SMEs struggle as skills shortages drive up Saudi salaries

  Saudi Arabia‘s non-oil economy is expanding at more than four times the rate of the oil sector, with the capital enjoying the lion’s share of that growth.  What this means for Elaify is that his 12-person team does not have the manpower to manage all the requests from would-be clients for auditing, certification and bookkeeping. Ideally, the company would bring in new workers to meet this rising demand, but a growing skills shortage, made worse by strict policies about employing more Saudi nationals, makes that easier said than done.  “There is so much work with everything that’s happening,” Elaify says. “Finding people to do it – experienced people – that’s the hard bit.”

• Trump sees the ‘Big Three’ as the coming force in global oil markets

  At last week’s CERAWeek conference of energy leaders in Houston, he caused a stir at one panel session by suggesting that Saudi Arabia, the US and Russia, which between them hold a commanding 40 per cent of world crude markets, may be privately thinking of an alliance that would rip up conventional thinking on oil. Burkhard’s comments were a distillation of a presentation he made recently to S&P clients. “In a potentially paradigm-shattering move”, he wrote, “the Big Three are pursuing shared interests in oil and geopolitical matters.” Houston oil people familiar with Washington thinking confirmed that the US administration is indeed contemplating an initiative along those lines, even if its deliberations have not yet crystallised into hard policy proposals.

• Dar Global targets Saudi expansion after land deals

  Dar Global, the international development arm of Saudi-listed Dar Al Arkan, has purchased two land plots in Jeddah and Riyadh for $390 million, advancing expansion plans in the kingdom, according to a statement to the London stock exchange. The acquisitions follow the launch of Trump Tower Jeddah and Neptune villa project in Riyadh, the London-listed developer said. The Jeddah segment, which includes 243 fully developed plots, was purchased for $93 million from a local Saudi landowner within a master-planned community. The second deal involves the acquisition of 190 plots in Riyadh, spread over 466,877 sq m, for $297 million. The land was bought from its parent company, with the project’s GDV estimated at $800 million, the company said.

• S&P upgrades Saudi Arabia’s credit rating after two years on economic diversification efforts

  S&P Global Ratings has raised Saudi Arabia’s credit rating for the first time in two years, citing the country’s economic diversification efforts and growth of its non-oil economy. The agency upgraded the kingdom’s rating to ‘A+’ from ‘A’ with a stable outlook on strengthened institutional settings amid Vision 2030 reforms, aligning Saudi Arabia with most ‘A’-rated peers, S&P said in a statement on Friday. “The upgrade reflects our view that the continuing social and economic transformation in Saudi Arabia is underpinned by improving governance effectiveness and institutional settings, including deepening domestic capital markets,” S&P said. “We believe that institutional checks and balances have become more visible as Vision 2030 progresses, as reflected by the recalibration of project priorities and timelines,” the agency added.

• CERAWeek 2025: triumphalism, agnosticism, and a touch of fear

  CERAWeek, the annual gathering of the energy elite in Houston, Texas, is an intense crash course in the state of world oil and gas markets, geopolitics and all the technological paraphernalia that keeps the global economy turning. There is an unspoken rivalry between CERAWeek and Adipec – the autumn gathering in the UAE which also draws a global energy audience – but in the era of President Trump and American “energy dominance”, Houston is the place to be in 2025. It’s difficult to distil the sheer weight of information that’s been laid out before me over the past week of dawn-to-early-hours days and many conversations with energy leaders.

• Gulf digitalisation growth barely moving needle in productivity

  Improvements in the availability and quality of digital infrastructure and services have yet to impact productivity growth in the Gulf economies in any meaningful way, according to IMF officials, past and present. The digitalisation of government services – through online portals for administrative tasks or e-procurement platforms – as well as the advent of tele-health services, fintech and e-commerce, allowed the Gulf states to better address the challenges associated with the Covid-19 pandemic. But improved productivity has proved more elusive, the officials said at a virtual event hosted this week by the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington DC. “How do we wrap those two together – huge benefits from digitalisation but still very weak productivity growth in the region?” said Tim Cullen, a former assistant director in the IMF’s Middle East and Central Asia department. “Is that something that in the next stage of digitalisation we may see reversed?”

• US vows to keep hitting Houthis until shipping attacks stop
  The United States will keep attacking Yemen's Houthis until they end attacks on shipping, the U.S. defense secretary said on Sunday, as the Iran-aligned group signaled it could escalate in response to deadly U.S. strikes the day before. The airstrikes, which the Houthi-run health ministry said killed at least 53 people, are the biggest U.S. military operation in the Middle East since President Donald Trump took office in January. One U.S. official told Reuters the campaign might continue for weeks. Houthi leader Abdul Malik al-Houthi said on Sunday that his militants would target U.S. ships in the Red Sea as long as the U.S. continues its attacks on Yemen. "If they continue their aggression, we will continue the escalation," he said in a televised speech.

• Saudi pours billions into Diriyah as megaproject nears completion

  Developer Diriyah Company — backed by Public Investment Fund — secured $1.6 billion in financing to develop the Wadi Safar project, an upscale residential community being built alongside ultra-luxury resorts the Six Senses, Aman, and an Oberoi, in view of a Greg Norman-designed golf course. Armani, the Italian fashion house that has hotels and residences in Milan and Dubai, said it would build 15 branded residences in Diriyah. Saudi Arabia’s $63 billion Diriyah megaproject is taking shape with a flurry of new deals as the kingdom looks to complete major construction works in the capital before it hosts Expo 2030.

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