WIIW The Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies - Wiener Institut für Internationale Wirtschaftsvergleiche

wiiw FDI Report 2016

09  June 2016    10:00 am CEST

wiiw presents its new analysis of FDI developments

Venue

wiiw, Rahlgasse 3, 1060 Vienna, lecture hall (entrance from the ground floor)

Description

In 2015, the FDI inflow to the Central, East and Southeast European (CESEE) countries fell to its lowest level since 2008, while global FDI recovered. The decline was especially severe in the EU Member States of Central and Eastern Europe, as well as in Russia, while expansions were recorded in the Western Balkans and Turkey. The first part of this report provides an analysis of the 2015 FDI trends in 23 countries, highlighting uneven developments.

New features of FDI have appeared recently in the Central European countries, which are deeply integrated into multinational production networks. FDI inflows fluctuate more wildly than before and have lost their close connection with economic growth or changes in the business environment. Capital relations between subsidiaries and parent companies have become more complex: capital reserves, losses and profits are shifted around within multinational conglomerates in various forms of FDI and income. Moreover, tax optimisation by multinational enterprises has become one of the main factors determining the economic sector or the immediate host country chosen by investors when they reorganise their assets into holdings. Round-tripping domestic capital distorts the FDI statistics, of Russia in particular.