Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, chairman of Kingdom Holding Company (KHC), recently held a series of business meetings in the US and Canada with CEOs and chairmen of prominent international companies in which KHC is a major investor in most of them. He was accompanied by a delegation from KHC. In a statement, KHC said Alwaleed held meetings with Vikram Pandit, CEO of Citigroup; Richard Parsons, chairman of Citigroup; Rupert Murdoch, chairman and CEO of News Corporation (News Corp.); Michael Larson, Cascade (Bill Gates' private investment vehicle); Isadore Sharp, chairman and CEO of Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts; Richard Nanula, chief financial officer at Colony Capital; and William Fatt, CEO of Fairmont Hotels and Resort. Alwaleed visited Citigroup headquarters on Thursday where he met with Pandit and discussed the latest developments in Citigroup and future plans of the company. Moreover, Alwaleed met with Parsons. In Jan. 2008, Alwaleed participated in a $12.5 billion private offering of convertible preferred securities of Citigroup. The new direct investment was made alongside an exclusive group of leading international investors. Alwaleed converted the preferred shares in 2009 into common shares (voting shares). He is the largest single shareholder in the company. Alwaleed was later received by Murdoch at the company's headquarters in New York. They discussed economic and investment issues especially in the media sector and the two discussed Rotana and LBCSAT which is 90 percent owned by Alwaleed. Moreover, the meetings focused on future potential collaboration with News Corp. KHC holds a 5.7 percent stake in News Corp. Alwaleed also held a meeting with Larson from Bill Gates's Cascade that has a stake in Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts. They discussed potential business collaboration. Furthermore, Alwaleed met with Sharp to discuss the latest updates at the company. Four Seasons, in which KHC holds a 47.5 percent stake, is co-owned by Cascade that also holds a 47.5 percent stake, and 5 percent of the Four Seasons is owned by Sharp. Alwaleed also met with Nanula to discuss the recent updates at the company. He also met with Fatt on current issues at Fairmont. In 2006 KHC and Colony completed a $5.5 billion acquisition of Fairmont Hotels & Resorts which was combined with the Raffles Hotels Group. KHC back in the black Kingdom Holdings, said on Wednesday it returned to profit in 2009 after a massive loss the previous year. Kingdom earned a net profit of SR155.5 million ($41.5 million) for the fourth quarter of 2009, its fourth straight quarterly gain, for a total profit in the year of SR402.6 million ($107.4 million). That marked a reversal from 2008, when Kingdom turned in a massive SR30.9 billion ($8.26 billion) loss for the October-December quarter and a nearly $8 billion- oss for the entire year. The holding group, 95 percent controlled by Alwaleed owns large stakes in Citigroup, Apple, News Corp., and other global businesses, as well as large holdings in luxury hotels and hotel management firms.
