RIYADH: China, the world’s second-largest economy, is on track to report “far lower growth” over the next decade amid high interest rates, predicted Kenneth Rogoff, an economics professor at Harvard University. Speaking at a panel titled “Face-Off: Experts forecasting the economy” on the first day of the Financial Sector Conference in Riyadh on Wednesday, Rogoff said the driving forces behind the Chinese economy were investments in infrastructure, commercial and residential real estate sectors but due to a significant surge in the interest rates the situation has changed and may lead to an economic slowdown. Seth Carpenter, the global chief financial economist at Morgan Stanley, said several business models in the market function on the assumption that interest rates will remain at a reasonably low level, but that situation has changed. “We are seeing a broader reassessment in the financial sector, in the banking sector for people just getting used to higher interest rates with money market interest rates at 5 percent that is just a far cry from the environment we’ve been in for the past 20 years and I think lots of business models have been set up on the presumption of low interest rates and we’re just not in that world anymore,” Carpenter said. Organized by Saudi Arabia’s Financial Sector Development Program partners, which are the Ministry of Finance, the Capital Market Authority, and the Saudi Central Bank, the conference is taking place at the King Abdulaziz International Conference Center in Riyadh It is set to build on the first edition in 2019, which sought integration between the financial sector ecosystem with its various means and tools, contributing to continuous growth within a framework of robust and solid fiscal stability, while employing innovative tools in the development and management of services. The conference also contributes to the Kingdom’s Financial Sector Development Program and is considered one of the most important events in the financial sector in the Middle East.