Hong Kong's Paul Chan to join Dimon, Dalio, mainland Chinese tycoons for major global investment conference

More than 6,000 investors, innovators, academics and policymakers including Hong Kong's financial secretary, Paul Chan Mo-po, American billionaire investor Ray Dalio, SoftBank's chief executive Masayoshi Son and Blackrock chairman Lawrence Fink, will fly into Saudi Arabia next week for a three-day investment conference.

Some 30 mainland Chinese entrepreneurs and senior executives, including Foxconn CEO Liu Young-way, will be among those in attendance.

The seventh edition of the forum organised by the Future Investment Initiative (FII) Institute, under the theme "the new compass" - a reference to the world's changing dynamics - aims to serve as "the unique global conversation platform" for leaders to discuss international development trends such as the future of artificial intelligence (AI), food security, energy and technology, according to FII chief executive Richard Attias.

It will take place in Riyadh from October 24 to 26, just a few weeks before the institute's regional summit, the FII Priority, will be staged in Hong Kong on December 7 and 8. "This will be the first time the Institute has staged the summit in Asia," Attias said in an interview with the South China Morning Post. The Asian event has over 300 people registered, with nearly 80 confirmed speakers, he said.

FII, a non-profit organisation under the management of the Public Investment Fund, Saudi Arabia's main sovereign wealth fund, plays a significant role in the government's Saudi Vision 2030 programme of economic and social reform.