Al Waleed Bin Talal he (born 7 March 1955) is a Saudi Arabian business tycoon and investor. He is a member of the Saudi royal family. He is the founder, CEO, and 95%-owner of Kingdom Holding Company. As of March 2012, his personal wealth was estimated to be US $18 billion.Arabian Business ranked him as the most influential Arab in the world. As of October 2012, the Bloomberg Billionaires Index listed Talal as the 16th-richest man in the world, with an estimated net worth of US $23.9 billion.Previously, Forbes listed Bettencourt as one of the wealthiest people in the world with a fortune estimated US $23.5 billion.
Al Waleed bin Talal was born on 7 March 1955. His parents are Prince Talal and Mona Al Solh, daughter of Riad Al Solh, Lebanon's first Prime Minister after its independence.Al Waleed is Prince Talal's second son. Therefore, Al Waleed is the grandson of Saudi Arabia's founder Ibn Saud. Al Waleed received a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from Menlo College in California in 1979. He then received a Master's degree in Social Science with honors from Syracuse University in 1985.
Al-Waleed owns the 85.9-meter (282-foot) yacht Kingdom 5KR,, originally built as the "Nabila" for Saudi arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi. The yacht posed as the Flying Saucer, the yacht of James Bond villain Largo in the film Never Say Never Again. It was later sold to Donald Trump, who renamed her Trump Princess. Al-Waleed bought back the yacht after Trump's second bankruptcy. He has ordered a new yacht currently known as the New Kingdom 5KR which will be about 173 meters (557 feet) long and carries an estimated cost of over $500 million. The yacht is rendered by Lindsey Design and is expected to be delivered in late 2010.[
Al Waleed owns several aircraft, all converted for private use: a Boeing 747, an Airbus 321 and a Hawker Siddeley 125. Also on order is an Airbus A380, the world's largest passenger aircraft, which is scheduled for delivery in 2012.This has been noted in the 2009 Guinness World Records as the largest private jet in the world.
Al Waleed bin Talal was born on 7 March 1955. His parents are Prince Talal and Mona Al Solh, daughter of Riad Al Solh, Lebanon's first Prime Minister after its independence.Al Waleed is Prince Talal's second son. Therefore, Al Waleed is the grandson of Saudi Arabia's founder Ibn Saud.
Al Waleed received a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from Menlo College in California in 1979. He then received a Master's degree in Social Science with honors from Syracuse University in 1985
Al Waleed began his business career in 1979 upon graduation from Menlo College. His activities as an investor came to prominence when he bought a substantial tranche of shares in Citicorp in the 1990s when that firm was in crisis. With an initial investment of $550 million ($2.98 a share after adjusting for stock splits, acquisitions, and spin-offs, according to Bloomberg calculations) to bail out Citibank caused by underperforming American real estate loans and Latin American businesses, his holdings in Citigroup now comprise about $1 billion. His investments in Citigroup earned him the title of "Arabian Warren Buffett".
His stake in Citibank once accounted for approximately half of his wealth, prior to the financial crisis of 2007–2010. At the end of 1990, he bought 4.9 percent of Citicorp’s existing common shares for $207 million ($12.46 per share)—the most that he could without being legally obliged to declare his interest. In February 1991, he spent $590m buying new preferred shares, convertible into common shares at $16 each. This amounted to a further 10% of Citicorp and took his stake to 14.9%. In 1999, The Economist expressed doubts about the source of income of Prince Al Waleed and whether he is a front man for other Saudi investors. Because his income in the 1990s was insufficient to cover his expenditures. "You could barely clothe a Saudi prince for such sums, let alone furnish him with a multi-billion-dollar empire. Nevertheless, by 1991 Prince Alwaleed had felt able to risk an investment of $797m in Citicorp", wrote the magazine.
Much of the charitable activities of Al Waleed are in the field of educational initiatives to bridge gaps between Western and Islamic communities. Over the years, he has funded a number of centers of American studies in universities in the Middle East and centers of Islamic studies in Western universities, which has given rise to concerns about their academic autonomy from Campus Watch and Jewish American interest groups
Immediately after the 9/11 attacks, Al Waleed gave a check of $10 million to New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani. He publicized a written statement upon his donation, stating "At times like this, we must address some of the issues that led to such a criminal attack. I believe the government of the United States of America should re-examine its policies in the Middle East and adopt a more balanced stance toward the Palestinian cause." As a result of his statement, Giuliani returned the check.
Al Waleed spoke to a Saudi weekly magazine, regarding the rejection of his check by the mayor: "The whole issue is that I spoke about their position [on the Middle East conflict] and they didn’t like it because there are Jewish pressures and they are afraid of them."
In 2002, Waleed donated £18.5 million to the families of Palestinians during a TV telethon following Israeli operations in the West Bank city of Jenin. The telethon was ordered by Saudi King Fahd to help relatives of Palestinian martyrs. The Saudi government maintained the term "martyrs" referred not to suicide bombers but to "Palestinians [who are] victimized by Israeli terror and violence.
In March 2008, Al Waleed Bin Talal had donated £8m to build an Islamic studies centre (to bear his name) at Cambridge University. A few months later, on 8 May 2008, he gave £16m to Edinburgh University to fund the "centre for the study of Islam in the contemporary world." In April 2009, Al Waleed donated $20 million to Harvard University, one of its 25 largest donations. He also donated the same amount to Georgetown University.His donation and others coming from Islamic sources have not been always welcomed due to their effects on academic objectivity and security concerns.
In 2002, Al Waleed donated $500,000 to help fund the George Herbert Walker Bush Scholarship at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts.
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