A State Fund Worth Billions
Syria has brought a broad range of public assets under a national sovereign wealth fund established by Presidential Decree No. 113 in 2025. The fund is mandated to manage state-owned holdings and to generate sustainable long-term returns from them.
Its assets are valued at approximately $2.5 billion in US dollars (USD). They include more than 70 million square meters of developable land spread across 47 separate locations, giving the fund an unusually large real-estate base from which to operate.
A $100 Billion Pipeline
The fund anchors a pipeline of planned projects whose combined value is estimated at close to $100 billion. Delivering them is expected to require between $40 billion and $50 billion in fresh investment, much of which would need to come from outside the country.
The pipeline's flagship is a Damascus New City development, valued on its own at $40 billion to $50 billion. About $7.6 billion of that figure is earmarked for infrastructure alone, underscoring the scale of construction envisaged around the capital.
Real Estate at the Core
The fund's value rests heavily on its land bank. The more than 70 million square meters under its control are spread across 47 sites, positioning real-estate development as the primary engine for the returns it is expected to deliver.
A dedicated real-estate development arm, headed by Muhammad al-Khayat, oversees this portfolio, working alongside the fund's central leadership.
Structure and Leadership
Operationally, the fund is divided into 36 specialized sectors and 11 central companies, with a combined workforce exceeding 40,000 employees.
Ibrahim Sakaria serves as general director, with Muhammad Abdullah al-Farr as his deputy. The board is chaired by Mazen al-Salehani, who simultaneously holds the tourism portfolio, linking the fund's leadership directly to a serving minister.
Questions Over Governance
The concentration of land and development assets under a single vehicle has placed governance at the center of debate. The central question is how transparency and operational independence will be ensured as billions of dollars in assets are managed.
The fund's design has been weighed against international benchmarks for sovereign wealth funds, including the Santiago Principles, which set standards for accountability and disclosure.