Davos here we come
World leaders and celebrities will press the flesh at annual economic forum,
Inside the World Economic Forum
The chances of finding world leaders hobnobbing with captains of industry and Nobel prize-winning economists while rock star Sheryl Crow warbles in the background would usually be slim. Not in Switzerland in January. Halfway up an Alpine mountain in the ski resort of Davos next week, the annual jamboree of the World Economic Forum gets under way. More than 2,800 of the world’s VIPS don winter gear for a four-day frenzy marking the event’s 50th anniversary.
Heads of state, chief executives, billionaires and central bankers – most of whom have flown in by private jet – will hold forth on this year’s theme of “stakeholder capitalism for a sustainable and cohesive world”. Worthy discussions on climate change dominate the agenda.
But offstage a frenzy of networking begins. “It’s the only place in the world when [Canadian prime minister] Justin Trudeau could accidentally tread on [former BT boss] Gavin Patterson’s foot,” says one regular.
The star turns will be climate campaigner Greta Thunberg and US president Donald Trump, attending for the first time in two years. The Prince of Wales puts aside the House of Windsor’s family difficulties to make his own address on Wednesday.
“When Trump is in town, you really understand where the power lies as security becomes a nightmare and it takes ages to get anywhere,” the veteran adds. Security costs for the event approach £8m.
Elsewhere, you may spot outgoing Bank of England Governor Mark Carney, the European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and an astonishing 53 heads of state. A contingent of the top brass from UK
‘When Trump is in town, you understand where the power lies as security becomes a nightmare’
plc – including Barclays chief executive Jes Staley and BP’S Bob Dudley – will gather to hear Chancellor Sajid Javid on Thursday.
But you won’t see Boris Johnson, who has granted Javid an exemption from a ban on ministers attending to focus on the “people’s priorities”. France’s Emmanuel Macron is also absent, as he battles ongoing strikes over pension reforms back home.
Nor will you see many locals, who rent out their apartments for upwards of £5,000. There’s money to be made for retailers leasing out shops to the likes of HSBC and Aberdeen Standard, which will be hosting delegates on Wednesday. Tony Blair – one of three former British PMS attending – will be pressing the flesh at JP Morgan’s do.
Prized invitations include those to the glitzy celebrity-filled bash hosted by PR guru Matthew Freud, accessed via ski-lift up to his chalet. Other hot tickets are the Salesforce party, where Sting played last year. Crow will be entertaining the guests of Philip Morris, while superstar DJ Mark Ronson is spinning the decks at the Wall Street Journal party.
But Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska – who had Cossack dancers and Enrique Iglesias at his party two years ago – is absent for the second year in a row thanks to US sanctions.
The big names will speak in the Congress Hall, but the real action is at the events on the Promenade, as well as in the nearby Belvedere Hotel, which is reputed to make much of its profit for the year in a single week.
“You have to be prepared to busk it – the chance meeting you might have at the Belvedere can often be as useful as the thing you’ve spent six months trying to set up,” says one regular.
Elsewhere, the big investment banks will host private dinners for the chief executives and “doing a year’s worth of eyeballing in the space of three days,” says an attendee.
In the Davos hierarchy, apart from world leaders – who don’t wear a badge – the £500,000-plus white badges are the access-all-areas tickets. Orange are for the press, green for flunkeys and purple for technicians.
The world may have seen a populist revolution with the rise of Brexit and Trump, but in Davos the global order remains intact, for four days at least.