I have savings of $1,000,000 and I'm ready for retirement, only concerned about the soaring inflation. Is this enough to retire comfortably, or do I need some sort of money management?

Ohh so spending billions to have elite athletes compete in empty stadiums is a waste of money???

Who would've guessed that wasting billions on useless megaprojects would result in financial deficits...

That line city is the single dumbest idea in all of human history. And that is saying something

The line sounded dumb at first, but now after hearing about it for a few years, it sounds even dumber

Just avoid any Saudi embassies in the next years, guys.

The line is definitely made of pure white Columbian

So the line got cut 99% to just 1%? ... Is that not the same as cancelled?!

What economy? Millions of third world slaves, Western skilled workers and a petrodollar-funded indigenous population

Who would've thought the guy who cuts critical journalists into tiny pieces is bad at listening to constructive criticism of his... let's call them economic development plans.

Spending money on improving the country ❌ Spending money on vanity projects ❎

MBS is the equivalent to a ego filled trust fund baby who thinks that market research and risk management is for losers.

I mean who in their right mind would even think of building a linear city. It just shows that having money doesn't necessarily go with having common sense.

Does the Vision 2023 mention Saudis actually showing up to work for a whole day, every day, every week? Coz that seems like super duper important.

Sounds like a classic case of pride goeth before the fall. They had every opportunity to spend their money wisely back while they were coasting on oil, but nope. And now here they are, unable to learn quickly enough as peak oil approaches.

Norway just sitting in the corner, on top of a huge pile money. And still not getting ronaldo.

Considering how cheap their subsidized energy prices are, they should be looking at diversifying into industry. The Arabian-Nubian shield geographic region is pretty well known to contain deposits of gold and many other critical metals and minerals; I feel like they should be looking at diversifying into the mining sector.

wait, building a city in a narrow straight line.. is a colossally stupid waste of money? Next you're going to tell me that Building a bunch of islands in the vague shape of a small earth out of sand will also be a waste of billions.

Please tell me that none of you ACTUALLY have any faith in that Line project

so we should stop calling The Line and start calling The Dot.

To quote former oil minister of Saudi Arabia Sheikh Ahmed Yamani: "All in all, I wish we had discovered water instead."

Unfortunately, without oil, these people will go back to living in tents in the desert within the next decade.

What they need to fix is laziness.

I often hear people talking about the profits they make from investing in Bitcoin and Forex. As someone new to this, how can I begin?

The problem is not the single industry. It's the single ruler.

Thanks. Experts are always the best in forex and cryptos 👍

Running a deficit after a whole producer is still cut from the global supply chain is impressively incompetent

You are telling me the Line and Octagon were terrible ideas for spending money. What a shock

The lowering of oil demand is such an exciting thing, a future with lower reliance on these countries only has positives ❤❤

What comes easy, goes easy

This is a pretty standard outcome when attempting to boost a planned economy that has already maximized output. Planned economies like the USSR, North Korea, China, and many others often see a boom in productivity when starting from nothing, but then they hit a peak. As the economy grows it grows more complex. It eventually grows too complex for any single person to be able to handle it well. The country then either tightens down on authoritarian measures oppressing opposition and the economy stagnates similar to how the USSR stagnated for decades, or they loosen up restrictions and allow the economy to control itself in a more democratic way. South Korea is a good example of this. It started planned and loosened up and became more democratic. Japan too, though this happened in the 1800s. China is an interesting blend where it loosened up a bit but hasn't let go of authoritarian control and is now beginning to face the same stagnation issue today. Saudi Arabia is in a similar boat. It's economy is too controlled. The solution to growing and diversifying the economy up is not to play SimCity and build a bunch of industry. Instead the solution is to focus on education, stability, and an openness for businesses to function organically. The more educated the population the more profitable the businesses and its people will be, so in the end education becomes paramount. This is something the US could learn as it's public education has been going downhill over the last handful of decades. This leads to people in the US growing poorer over the generations. Saudi Arabia could copy a blend of both Singapore and Norway. This way it wouldn't need to reinvent the wheel. There are countries that have already gone down this path and have found success. Right now Saudi Arabia is mirroring the attempts from countries that saw their economy stagnate. It's not too late. MBS is smart. Maybe he'll figure it out.

You are using pictures and slides of Dubai when talking about Saudi, pretty poor journalism.

Diversify your economy kids, you don't wanna fall like the little petrol economy of Venezuela

My friend, I appreciate the time you spend on keeping us informed about the economy. As of April 14th 2024. I count on $1,500 what do you suggest me to invest in?

"Im gonna draw a line here"- some servant- "He wants to draw a line" - some drugdealer "- and he wants a line, long as a continent" - some architect " and its gonna be a city". Meanwhile, they could have all that for cheap, with a damn and a greenhouse- cover over for a wadi.

A lot of Saudi bots in these comments. Might as well use the money while you can it seems

One has to question the true size of Saudi reserves. ARAMCO releases questionable data at best. The Saudis do have the infrastructure to increase and decrease their production at will like no other country but for how long. Would the changes be happening if the Saud family was not worried about their position?

Correction: Saudiarabia hasn't bought Activision Blizzard. Microsoft bought them in 2023

Great video 🤝

As a Saudi guy, I must say that you misunderstood our movement. For the league, our vision is to focus more on competition for views, especially since we are closer to viewers in India and China. We can't compete with Britch and spain in attendance numbers, It's hot here. For the Line project. Is a part of Saudi Arabia five Giga projects. With these projects, it will be a stupid thing to start using the project after finsh the building with maximum capacity. We will move on these Giga projects step by step, depending on the demand. And it will not be hard to go up later when there is an opportunity for that.

Reminder that SA has a gdp roughly equivalent to the US state of Pennsylvania. All the oil wealth, the wellfare state it enables, and the fabulous wealth of the royal family overshadow the simple fact they truly have practically nothing else going on.

Financial ruin will underpin a different political problem as well. That of authoritarian repression. While it hasn't been reported in international media, but many of these projects and reforms came on the back of extremely cruel repression. The land of the line project was inhabited by an old tribe who were forced into eviction and when people protested, they were sentenced to decades in prison. The social reforms of women's rights came as the orignal advocates of the reforms were jailed and tortured. Imams who spoke against the concerts were thrown into jail as well. All of this was done with the hope that it will bring about economic greatness. And when that doesn't come, this entire house of cards comes tumbling down. On a related note, an ever expansive government bureaucracy and it's jobs, even when not needed is a problem with all GCC states. I wonder what happens when the state cannot afford to keep a useless bureaucracy on a payroll problem that can only be exacerbated by AI.

Thank you!

Electricity in Germany is not 45 ct/kWh! You also have to be careful since househould, indistry and retail have different tariffs …

pov, u thought service based economies with managment of McKinsey/BCG and others can work.

I may not be the most financial savvy person, but spending billions on a line city through the desert probably wasn't a good investment.

very nice video!

Ultimately underpinning this topic

Remember folks.... The only way to make a ton of money with oil is when a war is going on, so financially, it is not convenient for Saudi Arabia or other OPEC countries to solve conflicts or wars. If a crisis lasts longer and affects the supply lines, it is better for them. Yes, it is not only the US and Russia that profit from war.

What you need to understand is that the increase in borrowing was communicated to the public in advance and it has been a government policy aimed at increasing the international markets’ connectivity with the Saudi economy. Furthermore the change in the stance on fundamentalism is aimed at unrooting the extremist ideology preached by the Muslim Brotherhood, and it is extremely popular due to the growing resentment against them and their motivations.

the image used at 0:50 is of dubai, uae not saudi arabia

Thanks

It will difficult to convince Game Developers in their 20's and 30's who love beer, weed, porn and premarital sex to move a country where all of that is illegal.

place that is a heaven for taxes and where population is not motivated to work is a perfect recipe for future disaster; not the most motivated and philantropic people living there

MBS forgot that splurging on a Bugatti is different from splurging on a mega-city

you could do a version of the line that was much shorter, say 10 stories, with nodes around station stops going higher (perhaps at a later date once the concept was proven). the height of the thing doesn’t make sense. I mean the whole thing doesn’t make sense, but IF you were going to do it, the money would go further if you did it at a more modest scale, at least initially.

Saudi would've done a lot better if it used its infinite money glitch on more normal projects like promoting businesses, investments, promoting real estate, tourism, making factories for stuff like car manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, and others in smaller provinces, etc in already existing huge cities such as Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam, Medina instead of making THE LINE. Honestly, I used to (and to some extent still like) the Neom project as being this new techy super-urban city, but the Line was outright stupid.

It's not great to have an economy based on just resources. It never goes well in the long run.

The line compared to the original line looks like a dash. They should just call it 1% Line

Only way they should be using their money is investing in Nuclear Fusion. They should either be racing towards a revolution in energy, or making sure that the age of petrol is going to last a bit longer.

Saudi could have been the go-to place for Abroad Education and Medical Tourism. They're already a hub for Religious Tourism.

Remember when he came to power and we all thought he would be the good Saudi prince, and everyone was excited for his Saudi Vision? Oh, to be so naive once more...

I am glad you did touch on the social reforms MBS is making in addition to the economic stuff you normally discuss

giving the expression "drawing a line in the sand" a hole new meaning

"ruling" a country with billions from selling oil, doesnt automatically make the country an economic powerhouse? who could have guessed?!

"I’m tired of being told that out of “tolerance for other cultures” we must let Saudi Arabia use our oil money to fund mosques and madrassa Islamic schools to preach hate in America, while no American group is allowed to fund a church, synagogue or religious school in Saudi Arabia to teach love and tolerance." - Robert A. Hall 🇺🇲

Dear TLDR team, We loved your video! It was critical but refreshing. Speaking of refreshments, we'd like to invite you to the Saudi embassy for hacksaws! Did we say hacksaws? We meant tea. We'd like to invite you for tea! Cheers, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

The line is upgaraded to rectangle unsuccesfully.

MBS is desperate, because he knows oil wont last forever

The 45ct/kWh price given for Germany is wrong. For consumers it's 30ct, for industry around 10-15. Still quite high, but no need to exaggerate.

i'm convinced that when someone told the saudis that they will run out of money, their first question was: can't we just buy more?

i think the more safer approach would be to decrease the kingdom's expenditures from extravagant projects and the sustaining the royal family's lavish lifestyle then focuse on buyinh government bonds and stocks of big companies that pays dividend with hundreds of billions in profit if saudi arabia invested their money they'll eventually make more money on their investments than what they currently making with their oil exports

First of all, the Neum project is a joke

In light of the ongoing global economic crisis, it is crucial for everyone to prioritize investing in diverse sources of income that are not reliant on the government. This includes exploring opportunities in stocks, gold, silver, and digital currencies. Despite the challenging economic situation, it remains a favorable time to consider these investments.

The more i see western especially American talking about country or president in a bad way is something nice which means they are going in the right way .

Hey TLDR ! I would love to see a video on Bahria Town, and DHA in Pakistan. These are private cities, in the country which further the wealth divide in country, which already has a huge wealth divide. I think it would be really interesting to know the exact numbers, as well as the environmental cost of these new dystopian private cities.

Apparently, building a futuristic miles long horizontal skyscraper apparently cost a lot of money.

Literally all they needed to do was put aside some of their wealth in diversified investments and the country could've floated along on the revenues forever even after oil. But no, they had to waste it on ridiculous nonsense.

"The Line" mathematically guarantees that you are on average at the maximum possible distance from your destination.

The clip at 00:50 is of dubai marina in the UAE not KSA.. :/

I am curious how much oil is actually left in their ground. They are very secret about it, unlike other oil countries. Also, their behaviour makes me think they don't have as much left as they would like us to believe. I could be wrong, but something isn't adding up.

Ok so: 1:33 the Saudi government oil revenue accounted for 62.2% of total revenue, with oil revenue down 12% yoy with a 2022 average of 10.6 Mbpd and a 2023 average of 9.6 Mbpd (a 9.4% decline in oil volumes production). Further, non-oil government government revenue rose 11%, from 410.9 to 457.7 billion riyals. 1:44 regarding private sector the number of Saudis working in the private sector has increased to 2.3 million, with the latest monthly data I could find being that 28.1k Saudis joined the private sector in March 2024, 18.1k in April. In total size, the private sector has grown from 10.8 million in Nov 2023 to 11.2 million by April 2024 (not a sign of a bad economy). The percentage of Saudis working in the public sector is 51.1%, not 66.6%. 1:51 "Well below market price" is a massive overstatement. The Saudis capped the internal cost of crude oil (and they do something else for nat gas but I'm not sure how that works) but for crude oil they capped it at $70 per barrel, with a production cost of under $10 per barrel, estimated at about $3-$7 per barrel. This cost of crude for internal use has been increased by Aramco since then, with cement and petrochemical companies being affected, I couldn't find the updated figure for this. 3:51 countries leave OPEC and rejoin, Angola, Ecuador, Indonesia, and Qatar have all left at one point, but they are either small producers or are net importers. 4:37 they didn't reduce the total size of the line, they simply changed the targeted population by 2030, the full length is still 170km. 4:55 the ministry of energy directed Aramco to put the plans on hold, that's because Aramco's spare capacity stands at 3 Mbpd, which is equivalent to the Canadian oil sands nearly. Aramco can still undergo the process of increasing capacity by 1Mbpd within ~4 years if asked to do so by the government. 5:18 the MoF has announced 2% yearly deficits as a share of GDP until 2026, with overall economic growth expected to be well above this, with 2024 expected at ~3%, and average to 2026 at ~4-5%, which is hard to predict and the ranges provided by the MoF on yearly deficits vary based on low to high income scenarios based on volatility in oil markets, but their deficits are a) very low as a share of GDP, b) sustainable and c) given their low base is completely affordable. When you stated non-oil economic growth, keep in mind interest rates have risen from ultra low 0.25% to nearly 6% in the kingdom, in line with Fed increases. These take 12 to 18 months to go through the economy, as such a slowdown in growth is to be expected. 6:37 ok no, not at all. The last time Saudi Arabia increased production to maximum levels, global prices fell by 30% in one day, so no it would not "comfortably offset decline in prices". The market needs to be balanced in the long term, and simply flooding the market would harm KSA far more than it would help. As a note on global oil demand, it is nearly impossible to predict the fortunes of Saudi Arabia, whether good or bad, today. That is because the largest issue they have faced in the past 15 years has been US shale, however the total size of US oil reserves stands equal to that of Algeria, yet the US produces 10x more, and the largest US field, the Permian, is the same size as Prudhoe Bay, which itself peaked at about 1.8 Mbpd, so it's hard to see how the Permiam (which pumps at 7 Mbpd) can possibly keep up this pace. A decline in Permian, and by extension US, oil production, would have dramatic effects on the oil markets. Another note needs to be taken that KSA has handled and come out of the covid pandemic extremely well, with the handling of the health and economic situations being extremely competent. Overall the Saudi economy, with a strong jobs creation, low debt levels across households, government, and non-financial businesses, low unemployment, and strong SME performance is in a good shape. The dual factors from rapidly rising interest rates in 2022 to mid 2023 and the cutbacks in oil productions are having an effect on the private sector and the public sector, but both are being handled very well, and the Saudi economy is still in a strong position to deal with future challenges and grow reasonably well. And I haven't even mentioned all the parts of Vision of 2030 that are either on progress, are outperforming, or have already met their 2030 goals. Things such as female participation (which plays into job creation and SMEs) has hit its target 7-8 years ahead of target. Tourism numbers are outperforming, non-oil government revenue are relatively on track, and many other aspects are as well.

Saudi hasn't made any reasonable investment. Nobody is going to Saudi for tourism. They should concentrate on building a technology with their wealth not buying technology into their country

Spending billions on huge mega projects which wont work and and pissing mony on unprofitble isn't working instead of investing in underlaying weaknesses

Its worse here, our economy is like a flailing fish, fighting for its life. The normal state of the U.S. economy is actually very bad. Because of this it goes into convulsive spasms fighting to grow any way it can out of desperation. Tricks, gimmicks, rule changes try to stimulate the economy and prevent it from falling but they only bring temporary relief to people since, when you factor in inflation we are declining.

If you visit saudi, you'll understand the reason behind the problem. Saudi citizens are given guaranteed jobs regardless of their qualifications and experience. They barely work for 2-3 hours in the office, keep scrolling phones, and just wait for late evening to enjoy till 2-4am. Expats work 10 times harder than them on the same job and get paid half of what a saudi citizen will get. Very few of them are properly skilled. Still, the majority of the population doesn't speak or understand English. They've huge colleges and universities with a size of a small city, but the quality of education is very low. In the last few years, MBS tried hard to change, but the pace is still concerning.

it's crazy how they're spending money on random things when norway is right there to show how it's supposed to be done.

6:34 why Venezuela production is always very low , even though they have the largest reserves

Everyone is roasting the Saudis in the comments and I totally get it. But……if this guy were to lose power it would be a tragedy. He seems to be doing more to bring his country, and the Middle East in general, into the future, at least in terms of human rights.

The collapse of the Arab states in the Middle East due to the world's decreasing dependence on oil was to be expected, but it is still so much more beautiful to experience.

Remind me again, how much do you guys pay for taxes in the west?

2:50: Venezuela learned that the hard way.

Saudi Arabia doesn't have any economic crisis, They have too much money.

I'm middle eastern, you won't believe how saudis actually think they are a developed nation and that they are 500 years ahead of the world just because they are rich, we try to tell them that being rich dosent mean you live in a developed country and this richness is all of because of the oil and slave labor from south asia, once the world finds something better than oil and the workers stop being enslaved and go to their homeland you will go back to living in tents, their only response is always: "you are just jealous of our development".

6:44 From a distance, their head rags look like pink anime hair.

More than halfway through its "Saudi Vision 2030" journey, Saudi Arabia has demonstrated notable progress, with 87% of the 1,064 initiatives either completed or advancing as planned.

Hey kids, debt to GDP ratio is the single most useless measure of all time, since GDP bears absolutely no relationship to a nation's ability to meet outstanding treasury obligations; the money for treasuries comes from the same place as fiscal expenditure: thin air. Wise up

Moral of the story Oil oil oil

A dessert is not a nice place to live.

The Line is now only A Point.