Abu Dhabi Finance Week expects about half of its 2026 sessions to be private, The National reported, in a bid to make executive meetings more useful for potential business deals.
Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM), the financial center that organizes the event, announced Sept. 24 that its fifth edition would feature 75 events across eight stages. It said more than 300 financial leaders representing over $61 trillion in assets had confirmed. The National later cited organizer projections of more than 80 events and 400 content sessions, over 40,000 attendees, including 8,000 senior executives, and about $70 trillion in assets under management.
The National quoted ADFW editor-in-chief Chris Hughes as saying private discussions are intended to give executives room for more candid conversations that can lead to concrete business activity. “It’s not just monologue, it’s dialogue,” Hughes said.
ADGM reported that the 2025 edition drew more than 35,000 attendees and included 68 events and 394 thematic sessions. It recorded 82 memorandums of understanding and partnerships that year, compared with 44 memorandums in 2024. Those totals do not specify whether any agreements came from closed-door meetings. The National reported that ADGM had not provided a separate count or combined value for agreements tied to such meetings.
ADGM also said a Web3 Leaders Roundtable at the 2025 event brought together about 40 senior decision-makers from financial institutions, regulators and infrastructure firms.
Separately, ADGM Chairman Ahmed Jasim Al Zaabi said 14 major global financial institutions managing more than $5 trillion in assets announced plans during the first half of 2026 to establish a presence in the center, the Emirates News Agency reported. The cited report did not name the institutions. EconoTimes previously covered the institutions’ plans to enter ADGM.
ADFW is scheduled for Dec. 7-10, 2026.
