Maan al-Sanea, the chairman and main shareholder of the Saad Group, was last in the headlines in 2004, when Oasis, one of his property developments in Saudi Arabia, was attacked by al-Qaeda terrorists.

The housing facility for expatriates in al-Khobar suffered a machinegun attack. Seven Indian employees were killed. The Saad Group chairman is said to have offered lifetime salaries to the employees’ next-of-kin, saying that the victims would remain on the payroll.

Unlike his fellow Saudi Prince Alwaleed, the Saad Group founder is not known for high-profile investments, such as yesterday’s purchase of a 3 per cent stake in HSBC, the British banking giant.

Both men have focused on banking and real estate, but while Prince Alwaleed has amassed stakes in Eurodisney, Citigroup and famous hotels, such as the Plaza in New York and the Savoy in London, Mr al-Sanea has kept his investment strategy out of the limelight.

His only startling investment, before the HSBC purchase, has been a 29 per cent stake in Berkeley Group, the British housebuilder run by Tony Pidgley. Last month, Berkeley said that it would launch a new joint venture with Saad worth £500 million.

Mr al-Sanea’s net worth is reckoned by Forbes magazine to be $7.5 billion (£3.8 billion). Most of the Saad Group wealth comes from construction and contracting deals in residential and industrial property in the kingdom, mainly in al-Khobar in the east of the country.

Saad Group began as the Saad Trading and Contracting Company, building basic infrastructure in Jeddah. Later it amassed a large land bank, on which it developed housing, sporting and leisure facilities for expatriate workers resident in the kingdom.

After the death of his eldest son, the Saad Group chief began to invest heavily in healthcare, developing hospitals and clinics, as well as private schools.

The Saad Group’s acquisition of a stake in HSBC forms part of the recent upswing of petrodollar wealth that has brought the Gulf’s billionaires to new prominence. Unlike in previous petrodollar cycles, much of the cash has been able to find a home in property and industrial investment opportunities in the Gulf as well as in privatisations such as the Saudi Telecom sell-off.

Competition is intense among the Gulf emirates, notably between Dubai and Qatar, for commercial leadership in the region. Meanwhile, the al-Maktoum family, rulers of Dubai, have been branching out, notably with the purchase of P&O Ports by Dubai Ports World and the acquisition of stakes in Tussauds and DaimlerChrysler. The Saad Group’s investment portfolio is managed from Geneva by Christopher Hart, an expatriate American who has worked for Mr al-Sanea for 16 years.

Mr Hart emerged as a key supporter of the controversial bonus scheme put in place by Berkeley on its restructuring three years ago. The scheme, which has since delivered a £120 million paper windfall to Mr Pidgley, faced opposition from a number of institutional investors, including Scottish Widows.

Mr Hart, who has worked for Bank of America and Citigroup in the Middle East, is a former captain in the US Army.

— Property spree

Oil prices have never made Middle East countries’ investment arms so flush with cash. Those of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Dubai are all ready to spend thanks to their countries’ combined current account surplus of $587 billion between 2005 and 2007. They spent $4 billion last year on UK commercial property, according to Jones Lang LaSalle, out of a $13 billion global property buying spree. (James Rossiter)

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