RIYADH, 12 March — Prince Alwaleed ibn Talal announced yesterday that he has spent $1 billion on stocks over the last six months, including another $500 million on Citigroup.
“Already the world’s largest shareholder in Citigroup, the prince’s shareholding in the world’s most profitable bank is now around $10 billion,” said a press release from his Kingdom Holding group.
“At about $43, Citi’s share price was at too attractive a price,” the prince said in the statement.
And he added $450 million to existing shares in AOL Time Warner. “The price was very cheap at around $23,” the prince said.
“I believe in the power of the AOL brand and I am already a shareholder in this global media giant. Therefore, when the price reached lucrative levels, we decided to increase our stake. The weakness in AOL’s stock price is temporary as it reflects the temporary weakness in several areas in which it is involved,” Alwaleed said.
He also increased his stake in priceline.com to $100 million, or 5.4 percent of the company.
“Priceline.com is one of the Internet companies that have survived the turbulence witnessed by the Internet arena. Ebay and Amazon, two other companies where we have investment stakes, will also be survivors and will prosper,” he said.
In the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, Alwaleed said his investment priorities would not change and that he had been accumulating US stocks since the outrages.
Prince Alwaleed, with his personal assets estimated at $20.3 billion, is ranked as the world’s fifth wealthiest entrepreneur by the US magazine Forbes.
He built his global financial empire by investing in major companies experiencing hard times.