|
Prince Al-Waleed investing in Costa Rica |
|
Billionaire Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia (the 13th richest person on the planet according to Forbes magazine) visited Costa Rica on August. He first flew to the Dominican Republic and then to Panama, from where he arrived to Costa Rica before finishing the trip in Guatemala.
He is the largest shareholder of the chain Four Seasons — which has a five-star hotel in Guanacaste’s Gulf of Papagayo. Al-Waleed, together with Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates paid $3.4 billion when they bought a majority of the Canadian hotel chain’s stock. Al-Waleed took the 22 percent of the stock while Gates bought 5 percent.
Al-Waleed also did some official business by meeting with Costa Rican President Oscar Arias at his house in San Jose.
Al-Waleed has done his fortune through investments in various industries, including real estate, banking, technology, mass media and luxury hotels. Through its firm, Kingdom Holding Company, Prince Al-Waleed participates in a large number of diverse companies based all over the world, including hotels, supermarkets, mass media, technology firms, etc.
Citigroup (banking)
Four Seasons hotel chain
George Hotel V in Paris
Beverly Wilshire Hotel in California
Savoy Hotel in London
Monte Carlo Grand Hotel in Monaco
Plaza Hotel in New York City
Disneyland Resort in Paris
AOL
Apple Inc.
Worldcom
Motorola
News Corporation Ltd.
Hewlett Packard
He has made donations for research and promoting education. Several U.S. universities have benefited from Al-Waleed’s multimillion-dollar gifts like Georgetown University (received $20 million from the prince for promoting Islamic studies). the Louvre Museum received $20 million to create a wing exclusively dedicated to Islamic art.
|
