DAVOS, Switzerland — The World Economic Forum’s annual conclave in the Swiss Alps is the greatest intersection of wealth and political power on the global calendar, but this year the balance is shifting.

Each January, forum organizers became used to announcing another record-setting list of national leaders, global officials and royalty making their way to the exclusive gathering.

WEF would attract even globalization’s strongest skeptics: from U.S. President Donald Trump to former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and climate campaigner Greta Thunberg.

While there are 52 heads of state of government heading to Davos this year, top-tier leaders are missing. U.S. President Joe Biden and his Chinese and Russian counterparts Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin are all giving it a miss.

French President Emmanuel Macron, who promised to Make the Planet Great Again, is also skipping the talkfest, along with new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and re-elected Brazilian President Luiz In?cio Lula da Silva.

Instead, it’s a European-heavy guest list: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is the only leader from a G7 country, sharing top billing with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, another German.

Even within European royal ranks, the forum this year is attracting the likes of Queen Maxima of the Netherlands — a U.N. financial inclusion envoy — rather than environmental campaigners such as King Charles and Prince William.

Some of the most prominent tech companies are dialing back their participation amid rounds of heavy layoffs.

And the biggest party hosts in town — Russian oligarchs — remain forced out by sanctions levied since Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has unrivaled star wattage among the Davos crowd — but even a video appearance from him this year will be treated as below par, given how many of them he now does.

It’s the C-Suite, stupid!

With the global political elite mostly absent, WEF is this year choosing to focus on rising CEO numbers.

Among 2,700 participants in official WEF sessions, “we’re likely to surpass the old record from 2020 with 600 global CEOs — including 1,500 C-suite level overall,” said WEF’s head of digital and marketing George Schmitt, who added that 80 of the CEOs are first-timers in Davos.

Those who claim Davos is dead are yet to be proven right, but WEF’s critics now spread beyond the activist world who have long disparaged the juxtaposition of private jet opulence with hand-wringing panels about global poverty.

WEF would attract even globalization’s strongest skeptics: from U.S. President Donald Trump to former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and climate campaigner Greta Thunberg