Saudi Arabia, immersed in the process of using its oil wealth for building sustainable economic strength, has set its eyes on a business bonanza that could provide unending riches: becoming the host for a major international financial market. To tap into this permanently renewing resource, the kingdom is pouring billions into the creation of two financial hubs. The first of these finance centers is part of the King Abdullah Economic City (KAEC), which the Saudi king announced to the world in December 2005. The second is new. It is the King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) project in the Saudi capital, Riyadh. Investments into KAEC are slated in a dimension of more than $26 billion only in the first phase—which includes infrastructure development and industrial and residential structures, but not the financial island which will cover 14 hectares. The cost of developing the new metropolis’s financial center—a super-glitzy city-within-a-city, shining in
