TMF's Saudi head says the Kingdom's 2026 slowdown is an overdue reorg — not conflict fallout

The 2026 slowdown that has unnerved investors in Saudi Arabia is a deliberate restructuring rather than fallout from regional conflict — at least according to the firm tasked with getting foreign companies to set up in the Kingdom. Omer Saleem, country head for Saudi Arabia at corporate-services provider TMF Group, tells EnterpriseAM that the soft patch was planned and is healthy for an economy that has run hot for years.

Saudi Arabia has been undergoing a structural reorganization since 3Q 2025, one the market has misread, Saleem says. “People are focusing on the conflict, but… this restructuring was due, and it’s a healthy development if you want to keep growing over the next five years.” The pain is the point: “These changes don't come without pain.”

Saleem’s read is a bullish one: TMF earns its fees from onboarding the companies betting on Saudi, and its own book in the Kingdom has grown at double-digit y-o-y rates for three straight years. That, he said, is why a correction was overdue. “You cannot expect everything to just keep going up.”

Why it matters: The call cuts against the dominant narrative — that the regional security picture is what’s weighing on the Kingdom this year. If Saleem is right, the investors waiting for the conflict to clear before committing capital are watching the wrong variable.

More and more Asian companies are riding out the adjustment. Inbound demand has tilted toward Asia-Pacific markets over the past four years — China, Singapore, Indonesia, and India — after a decade dominated by North America and Europe. “The majority of the business we were seeing in the last 10 years was [from] North America and Europe,” Saleem said. “Now, we're starting to see a lot of it come from APAC.” The interest spans tech, logistics, pharma, industrial services, and smart manufacturing. TMF has onboarded entrants from fast-fashion retailer Shein — which set up in a Saudi special economic zone — to suppliers tied to Lucid Motors.

The bigger prize, and the bigger holdup, is capital markets. Saleem expects financial services to rank among the most attractive sectors over the next four years, with the Saudi Central Bank and the Capital Market Authority moving fast to upgrade the framework. But clients are holding back pending reforms in two specific areas — freezones and a common-law venue.

SOUND SMART- A common-law venue is a ring-fenced financial zone with its own English-language courts and rules, carved out of a country’s onshore legal system. Dubai’s DIFC and Abu Dhabi’s ADGM are the regional templates, and firms can opt into their courts by contract, even on deals with no physical link to the zone. It’s that predictability, not the tax breaks, that draws fund managers and asset servicers.

BACKGROUND- Saudi Arabia is chasing USD 100 bn in annual FDI by 2030, a target it has yet to hit even as the headline programs overshoot. More than 700 multinationals have now established regional headquarters in the Kingdom against an original goal of 500.

What’s next? Saleem is watching 4Q 2026 for the first signs of the restructuring paying off. His advice to anyone rattled by the soft year is to treat it as structural. “If you operate in Saudi and you have a long-term vision, you have to prepare for these. They come every five, six years.”