Qatari Sovereign Wealth Fund Promotes Mohammed Al-Sowaidi to CEO

The Qatar Investment Authority has promoted Mohammed Al-Sowaidi to be the sovereign wealth fund’s new CEO, effective immediately.

Al-Sowaidi, previously the QIA’s CIO for the Americas, succeeds Mansoor Ebrahim Al-Mahmoud, who was named Qatar’s minister of public health. Al-Mahmoud had been CEO since 2018.

Al-Sowaidi joined the QIA in 2010 with a focus on technology, media and telecommunications investments, along with investments in industrials and private equity. Prior to his stint as CIO of the Americas, Al-Sowaidi was head of the QIA-Advisory Office in New York, which provides investment research and advisory services concerning current and potential investments in the Americas.

Prior to joining the QIA, Al-Sowaidi worked as director of corporate banking at Masraf Al-Rayan, where he specialized in the government and real estate sectors. Before that, he was a financial analyst at ExxonMobil Treasury, which develops and implements financial policies for the oil giant’s global operations.

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The appointment follows the hiring by the QIA of Kevin Zhu in July as acting chief of investment strategy.

The QIA, estimated to have been established in 2005 to protect and grow Qatar’s financial assets and to diversify the economy, does not publish information on the amount of assets it has under management. The fund manages more than $500 billion, according to published estimates.