Business

A decade into Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, the non-oil sector makes up 56% of $1.3 trillion economy

Published

2 weeks ago

October 27, 2025

Good morning from Riyadh, where we are hosting the Fortune Global Forum. We’ve had some fascinating conversations about the business implications of the convergence of technology, geopolitics, demographics and more. AI was top of mind, from Google President Ruth Porat’s predictions about curing cancer to influencer Jordi van den Bussche’s business that’s built on creating 10,000 videos of himself every day, using an AI-generated avatar.

With its investments in AI infrastructure and obvious strengths on the power front, this is a country that is building out data centers and positioning itself as a hub for AI, entertainment, sports, finance, high-tech manufacturing and more. Almost a decade into the kingdom’s Vision 2030 economic transformation plan, the non-oil sector now contributes 56% of the Kingdom’s $1.3 trillion economy, women’s labor force participation (34%, according to the World Bank’s latest data) is surpassing early targets, and 675 global companies are now licensed to establish regional headquarters in Riyadh.

Barclays is the latest to announce a presence in Riyadh. The British lender says it’s returning to Saudi Arabia after an 11 year absence. At the Global Forum, CEO C.S. Venkatakrishnan said he’s aiming to work with trusted partners “who are there for the long term and who will help you through the teething troubles.”

But Saudi Arabia is obviously not immune to geopolitics, tariffs, investor sentiment and the challenge of finding meaningful employment for its young population. Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Investment, Khalid A. Al-Falih told Fortune Editor-in-Chief Alyson Shontell that 2025 is a pivotal moment in which “the very foundations of global business are being shaken, in a way, and being rewritten before our own eyes.”

I had a fascinating conversation with three leaders from the front lines of business in Africa, which has the youngest population on earth, with a median age of 19. Over the next 25 years the combined GDP of Africa’s 54 nations is expected to grow tenfold while the U.S. is expected to jump 30%.

I’ll be back tomorrow to report from Global Forum Day 2, which includes interviews with Delta CEO Ed Bastian, HKEX CEO Bonnie Chan, Standard Chartered CEO Bill Winters, JPMorgan’s Mary Erdoes, Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao, and Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio. The program is underway and you can watch the livestream here.

More news below.

Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com

Top news

Trump in Asia

U.S. President Donald Trump is visiting Asia and is upbeat about his upcoming talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Tump also predicted the two sides could broker a deal on TikTok as early as Thursday, when he’s set to meet Xi to talk about export controls, fentanyl, and shipping fees. On his first stop in Malaysia, Trump signed trade and mineral agreements with the host country and Cambodia.

U.S.-China trade war eases

Ahead of Trump’s Xi meeting, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced that an extra 100% tariff on China is “effectively off the table” as China eases its grip on rare earth metals. Bessent said that soybean farmers, who have been struggling as China has held off purchases of the crop this season, will be “extremely happy with this deal.”

Trump threatens additional 10% tariff over TV ad

Meanwhile, Trump’s trade war with Canada is back on. Trump announced plans to impose an additional 10% tariff on Canada on Saturday over a TV ad featuring footage of former President Ronald Reagan criticizing tariffs. The ad was produced by the Ontario government.

Milei’s big win

President Javier Milei of Argentina scored a big political win on Sunday with his party more than doubling its representation in Congress. The electoral mandate will breathe fresh life into Milei’s free-market experiment, which Trump has backed with a $40 billion U.S. bailout.

Target leans back towards DEI

Target last week highlighted its partnership with the Russell Innovation Center for Entrepreneurs that provides education and other services to Black founders of small businesses. The mention comes after months of boycotts and criticism after the retailer distanced itself from diversity, equity, and inclusion policies.

The markets

S&P 500 futures up 0.79% this morning. The last session closed up 0.79%. STOXX Europe 600 was up 0.05% in early trading. The U.K.’s FTSE 100 was down 0.05% in early trading. Japan’s Nikkei 225 was up 2.46%. China’s CSI 300 was up 1.19%. The South Korea KOSPI was down 2.57%. India’s NIFTY 50 was up 0.66%. Bitcoin is up at $115K.

Around the watercooler

Founder of $100 million company says she quit her day job to rebuild her father’s Cape Cod chip empire—and there ‘wasn’t time’ to worry about nepotism by Emma Burliegh

Meet all 37 White House ballroom donors funding the $300 million build, including Silicon Valley tech giants, crypto bros and the Lutnicks by Nino Paoli

The housing market’s fall surprise: Buyers are back, and Zillow says the momentum isn’t over yet by Ashley Lutz

Inside the $22 trillion world of private capital, an asset class so big it would be the world’s second-largest economy by Nick Lichtenberg

CEO Daily is compiled and edited by Joey Abrams and Claire Zillman.

This is the web version of CEO Daily, a newsletter of must-read global insights from CEOs and industry leaders. Sign up to get it delivered free to your inbox.

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Business

Credit card companies are jacking up annual fees for airport lounges

Published

12 minutes ago

November 10, 2025

Jace Porter

For every passenger trying to decide if a $17 slimy ham and cheese croissant and their phone’s 34% remaining battery will sustain them for a four-hour layover, there’s someone smugly sipping a complimentary gin and tonic in a secret luxury lounge.

Once a refuge for frequent business travelers, airport lounges are increasingly becoming more popular (and crowded) with casual travelers, encouraging some companies to create even more exclusive spaces—or raise the barrier to entry:

Capital One opened its largest lounge (13,500 square feet) in June at NYC’s JFK Airport, complete with Ess-a-Bagels and a designated cheesemonger (as well as classic lounge amenities, like shower suites and a cocktail bar).
Over half of JFK’s overall Terminal 4 lounge space has been added in the last two years.

How much would you pay for exclusivity?

The increase in global airport lounge visits in 2024 (31%) has outpaced growth in air traffic overall (10.4%) compared to the previous year. And access isn’t cheap. United charges $750 annually for individual access to its airport lounge network. Amex recently announced that the annual fee for its Platinum card—which includes the perk of lounge access—is increasing from $695 to $895. And one of the most popular travel perk cards, the Chase Sapphire Reserve, just ratcheted up its annual fee from $550 to $795.—MM

This report was originally published by Morning Brew.

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Business

Trump’s $2,000 tariff ‘dividends’ would cost twice as much as the revenue coming in, budget watchdog warns

Published

43 minutes ago

November 10, 2025

Jace Porter

President Trump’s recent proposal to pay Americans “at least $2,000 a person” from new tariff revenue—a policy he calls “tariff dividends”—is facing sharp criticism from a budget watchdog, who calculates that the plan will actually lose twice as much money for the country as the tariffs are generating.

Writing in a weekend post on Truth Social, Trump argued that tariff revenues could be redistributed directly to individuals in the form of annual payments, with “high income people” excluded from the payouts. The idea, pitched as a way both to reward taxpayers and possibly reduce the national debt, bears a strong resemblance to the structure of the COVID-era Economic Impact Payments, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget (CRFB).

But the numbers reveal a steep fiscal challenge. The CRFB estimates that distributing just a single round of $2,000 payments to Americans—calculated to match the COVID payments, which included both adults and children—would cost the federal government around $600 billion per year. By contrast, the tariffs that Trump has championed have raised about $100 billion to date and, even accounting for pending legal cases, are only projected to raise about $300 billion annually going forward.

Deficits could skyrocket

“If tariff dividends are paid annually, deficits would increase by $6 trillion over ten years,” the CRFB writes, “roughly twice as much as President Trump’s tariffs are estimated to raise over the same time period.” This means not only that the revenue from tariffs would fail to cover dividend payouts, but also that the policy would exacerbate America’s long-term fiscal challenges.

To put the numbers in perspective, if dividends were paid out on a “revenue neutral” basis—matching payouts to actual tariff revenue—the analysis estimates that payments could be made only every other year, starting in early 2027. Should the Supreme Court uphold current lower court rulings that have deemed some of Trump’s tariffs illegal, remaining tariffs would only cover the dividend payments once every seven years.

Debt implications

Beyond blowing past the revenue generated, diverting all tariff proceeds to pay these dividends would restrict the government’s ability to use tariff income for reducing deficits or paying down debt, as some administration officials have proposed. The CRFB warns that using all tariff revenue for rebates would push federal debt to 127% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by 2035, compared to 120% under current law. If $2,000 dividends were paid annually, that figure could jump further, reaching 134% of GDP over the same period.

Such projections come at a time when annual budget deficits are nearing $2 trillion and national debt is quickly approaching an all-time high, making fiscal discipline a top concern for watchdogs and policy analysts.

Trump’s proposal draws inspiration from pandemic-era Economic Impact Payments (EIPs), but those measures were carefully income-tested to phase out payments for individuals earning over $75,000 and joint filers over $150,000. The CRFB said its analysis used similar eligibility parameters for its cost estimate, suggesting that without strict limits, the fiscal hit could be even higher.

For this story, Fortune used generative AI to help with an initial draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.

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Business

Wendy’s plans hundreds of store closures to boost profits

Published

1 hour ago

November 10, 2025

Jace Porter

Wendy’s plans to close hundreds U.S. restaurants over the next few months in an effort to boost its profit.

The Dublin, Ohio-based chain said during a conference call with investors Friday that it planned to begin closing restaurants in the fourth quarter of this year. The company said it expected a “mid-single-digit percentage” of its U.S. stores to be affected, but it didn’t give any more details.

Wendy’s ended the third quarter with 6,011 U.S. restaurants. If 5% of those locations were impacted, it would mean 300 store closures.

The new round of closures comes on top of the closure of 240 U.S. Wendy’s locations in 2024. At the time, Wendy’s said that many of the 55-year-old chain’s restaurants are simply out of date.

Ken Cook, Wendy’s interim CEO, said Friday the company believes closing locations that are underperforming – whether it’s from a financial or customer service perspective – will help improve traffic and profitability at its remaining U.S. restaurants.

Cook became Wendy’s CEO in July after the company’s previous CEO, Kirk Tanner, left to become the president and CEO of Hershey Co.

“When we look at the system today, we have some restaurants that do not elevate the brand and are a drag from a franchisee financial performance perspective. The goal is to address and fix those restaurants,” Cook said during a conference call with investors.

Cook said in some cases, Wendy’s will make improvements to struggling stores, including adding technology or equipment. In other cases, it will transfer ownership to a different operator or close the restaurant altogether.

U.S. fast food chains have been struggling to attract lower-income U.S. consumers in the past few years as inflation has raised prices. In the July-September period, Wendy’s said its U.S. same-store sales, or sales at locations open at least a year, fell 5% compared to the same period last year.

Cook said $5 and $8 meal deals — which have been matched by McDonald’s — have helped bring some traffic back to its U.S. stores. But Wendy’s isn’t doing a good job of bringing in new customers, Cook said, so the company plans to shift its marketing to emphasize its value and the freshness of its ingredients.

Wendy’s shares dropped 7% Friday. On Monday, they were down 6% in afternoon trading.

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