LONDON, Oct 29 (Reuters) - Global business, technology

and financial leaders converged on the Saudi capital for the

annual Future Investment Initiative (FII) summit this week.

The event is an opportunity for attendees to forge relations

with some of Saudi Arabia's biggest companies and its $925

billion sovereign wealth fund. It comes at a time when there are

fears of widening conflict in the Middle East and just a week

before the U.S. presidential election.

Below are a selection of quotes from some of the speakers at

the event on Tuesday:

DAVID SOLOMON, GOLDMAN SACHS ( GS ) CEO:

"It's hard to think about monetary policy in 2025 in the

United States until you get through the election and we get a

clearer sense of policy actions."

"Structurally inflation is more embedded in the global

economy than the current narrative. That doesn't mean that it's

going to rear its head in a particularly ugly way but I do think

there's the potential, depending on policy actions taken, that

it could be more of a headwind than the current market

consensus."

"We are in a recovery period and my expectation is you will

see more robust capital markets activity in 2025, 2026."

BLACKROCK ( BLK ) CEO LARRY FINK:

Fink said that the central bank policy "playbook" needed to

be revisited because the transmission of higher rates to slow

the economy had a greater lag as populations aged and due to

changes in the housing market.

"I do believe we have greater embedded inflation in the

world than we've ever seen," he said.

KEN GRIFFIN, FOUNDER AND CEO OF CITADEL:

Griffin said that markets expected Donald Trump to win the

forthcoming U.S. election, but that the outcome remained "almost

a coin toss".

"We're at that moment of peak uncertainty," Griffin said,

adding that he expected risk appetite to improve in markets

regardless of the result.

RUTH PORAT, PRESIDENT AND CIO OF ALPHABET AND

GOOGLE:

Porat said the Silicon Valley giant was excited about the

prospects for autonomous vehicles, adding the technology could

help improve road safety.

"If you want to save lives, we should be embracing

autonomous driving."

BLACKSTONE CEO STEPHEN SCHWARTZMAN:

He said communications between the U.S. and China had

"normalised somewhat", after communications between the two

sides broke down around two years ago, presenting a "very scary

prospect".

"I think that both countries are basically grateful that the

deterioration in relations has stopped."

ERIC SCHMIDT, FORMER CEO OF GOOGLE:

"So war is today defined stereotypically as 'man, gun,

shooting, other man, shooting, trying to kill each other'. If

you're a computer scientist, this makes absolutely no sense. The

guns should be automated, and the people should be drinking

coffee somewhere else."

"If you are a roboticist, the fastest path to robots is, in

fact, drone warfare, I'm sorry to say.... There are enormous

implications from the arrival of drone warfare.

"My own view is that drone warfare will largely stop land

wars, and that conflict will not go away. It'll occur in

different domains."

SAUDI ECONOMY AND ENERGY MINISTER PRINCE ABDULAZIZ BIN

SALMAN:

"We will monetize every molecule of energy this land has,

period."

JANE FRASER, CITI CEO:

"A lot of the roads do lead to the U.S. at the

moment...While you shouldn't bet against a Saudi entrepreneur

you certainly never bet against an American one."

(Compiled by Tommy Reggiori Wilkes and Iain Withers; Editing by

Sharon Singleton)