Libya to Invest $100 Billion Abroad, Spend $155 Billion at Home

Libya to Invest $100 Billion Abroad, Spend $155 Billion at Home

By Maher Chmaytelli

Dec. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Libya has $100 billion set aside to buy foreign assets and $155 billion to spend on local projects such as housing, energy, and communications, as record oil prices swell its income, Prime Minister Baghdadi Mahmudi said.

The North African nation is considering foreign stocks, bonds and properties in established and emerging markets, Mahmudi said in an interview late yesterday in Tripoli. ``We are now preparing to invest more than $100 billion outside Libya, in different fields,'' he said, declining to name targets or regions.

The owner of Africa's largest oil reserves has deposited budget surpluses in a sovereign wealth fund designed to build up savings for future generations for when petroleum fields run dry. It's emulating Abu Dhabi, Kuwait and other Arab states of the Persian Gulf that invest part of their wealth overseas.

Africa's second-biggest oil producer after Nigeria exports $135 million worth of crude every day, when prices are at $90 a barrel, according to state-run National Oil Corp.

Oil-importing nations such as the U.S. and Japan have transferred a combined $3 trillion more to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries since 2001 than they would have paid had oil stayed near $20 a barrel, according to an estimate by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. The price of crude oil tripled in four years to a record $99.29 a barrel last Nov. 21.


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