Saudi foreign assets to dip by $90bn in 2009

Saudi Arabia's push to fund its record budget this year to ease the fallout of the global economic crisis is expected to depress its foreign assets by nearly $90 billion (Dh330bn), a key Saudi financial centre said yesterday.

The Riyadh-based Jadwa Investments and Financing said the Gulf kingdom's economy could have shrunk in the first four months of 2009 because of a sharp cut in its oil output but expected an improvement in the non-oil sector in the next months because of high government spending.

From about $506.3bn at the end of 2008, the foreign assets of the kingdom's central bank, Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency (Sama), are projected to dive by nearly $90bn to $416.5bn at 2009-end because of Sama's withdrawal from the assets to fund public expenditure.