Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is planning to withdraw financial support from LIV Golf. 

The wealth fund announced its $1 trillion five-year spending plan. The fund’s governor said that his focus was on increasing efficiency in the fund’s investments.

Saudi Arabia already has many long-term investments. They will be hosting the World Expo in 2030 and the World Cup in 2034.

No official source has given a reason for the LIV Golf funding specifically being cut. However, the head of the fund, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, gave reasons for the general cuts.

“There needed to be a reconsideration of the timing of some investments,” Al-Rumayyan said, speaking during a news conference in Riyadh, the kingdom’s capital.

The fund has made major investments in Uber, SoftBank and the English Premier League in recent years. 

LIV Golf has been one of their least successful ventures. It’s estimated that the league has cost Saudi Arabia around $5 billion since its initial $2 billion investment.

This $2 billion investment turned a lot of heads. The PGA Tour is estimated to make $400 million in profits. Even if Saudi Arabia thought their league could overtake the PGA, there was no world where they’d make $2 billion or more. 

LIV Golf did put this massive investment to use. They signed notable golfers like Jon Rahm, Bryson DeChambeau, Brook Koepka, Dustin Johnson, Cameron Smith and Phil Mickelson. 

Mickelson was the most notable name to join LIV. He won 45 PGA Tour events and six championships. In 2021, he became the oldest player to win a PGA Championship at age 50. 

If the league disbanded, the golfers would need to return to the PGA Tour to continue golfing. Golfers may face suspensions for leaving the league or will need to requalify on the Korn Ferry Tour. 

LIV Golf’s newest golfers are hearing criticism on all sides after joining its Invitational Series. Northern Irish golfer Graeme McDowell said that he continues to receive death threats and messages telling him to “go die” after he joined the Saudi-financed tour.

The newest tour is backed by the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund (PIF), a fund run by chairman Mohammed bin Salman, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia. Many golfers have been criticized for joining the tour, being portrayed as money-grabbing. McDowell had previously been asked about the idea of accepting money from the controversial Saudi Arabian regime, to which he replied that it was “incredibly polarizing.”

Bin Salman has been isolated due to his alleged involvement in approving the operation that led to the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.

When asked about the incident, McDowell attempted to separate the golf from the regime. “I think we all agree up here, take the Khashoggi situation; we all agree that’s reprehensible. Nobody is going to argue that fact,” he said. “But we are golfers. Speaking personally, I really feel like golf is a force of good in the world. I just try to be a great role model to kids. I know what the game of golf has taught me. I love using the game of golf as something to kind of help grow around the world. That’s pretty much what we’ve been for the last 20 years, being role models for kids and try to use this game, like I say, as a force of good really.”

LIV Golf faced heavy protest prior to their first U.S. event in Portland last week from 9/11 survivors and victims’ families.

“We are not politicians. I know you guys hate that expression, but we are really not, unfortunately. We are professional golfers. If Saudi Arabia wanted to use the game of golf as a way for them to get to where they want to be and they have the resources to accelerate that experience, I think we are proud to help them on that journey using the game of golf and the abilities that we have to help grow the sport and take them to where they want to be,” McDowell said.

McDowell won the US Open in 2010.

Saudi Arabia has just reached a major social justice milestone: beginning in early 2018, women will be allowed to enter sports stadiums.

Saudi Arabia women’s rights news

The move comes one month after the predominantly Sunni Muslim Middle Eastern country — known for limiting women’s rights in many public areas — allowed women to drive. It is the only nation in the world to have had such a ban.

Arenas in three major Saudi cities — Jeddah, Dammam and Riyadh — will be set up to accommodate families, said a statement from the nation’s General Sports Authority.

The three stadiums are called King Fahd Stadium, King Abdullah Sport City and Prince Mohammed Bin Fahd Stadium. The stadiums are home to six teams in the Saudi Professional League — the top division — and two of the three stadiums included have the highest seating capacity in the kingdom.

Under Saudi Arabian law, women cannot marry, divorce, travel, get a job or have elective surgery without permission from their male guardians. They are also forbidden from freely interacting with members of the opposite sex, and are required to wear a full-length black abaya in public.

However, the two latest pro-women laws are part of 32-year-old Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s ambitious reforms, as laid out in his “vision for 2030” plan.

At an investment conference last week in Riyadh, Salman promised the kingdom would destroy “extremist ideologies” and instead veer towards “a more moderate Islam.”

“We want to lead normal lives, lives where our religion and our traditions translate into tolerance, so that we coexist with the world and become part of the development of the world,” he said.

For the first time ever in September, women were allowed to enter King Fahd Stadium for a celebration commemorating the kingdom’s 87th anniversary. They were seated in a specific section for families. The move drew both support and strong criticism, the latter from conservatives.

It was also revealed on Monday that Saudi Arabia plans to extract uranium domestically as part of its nuclear power program, a move designed to increase self-sufficiency in producing atomic fuel.

JEDDAH, SAUDI ARABIA – SEPTEMBER 05: A general view of the stadium prior to the FIFA World Cup qualifier match between Saudi Arabia and Japan at the King Abdullah Sports City on September 5, 2017 in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. (Photo by Kaz Photography/Getty Images)