The Scoop
The new CEO of Saudi Arabia’s highest profile investment summit has quit after just six months on the job.
Penny Richards, who joined from the Aspen Institute in February, has left the Future Investment Initiative Institute, according to an internal document seen by Semafor and a person familiar with the matter. FII Institute organizes the kingdom’s flagship conference that has attracted Wall Street titans including BlackRock’s Larry Fink, Goldman Sachs’ David Solomon, and Citigroup’s Jane Fraser, and spawned billions of dollars in deals.
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Richard Attias, who helped establish FII almost a decade ago, is stepping back into the role of CEO while the search for a new boss restarts. He is also preparing for an IPO of his firm, Richard Attias & Associates, which organises FII’s events and is majority-owned by a unit of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund.
An FII Institute spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.