The inflow of foreign direct investment (FDI) last year reached its highest since 2008, amounting to $4.046 billion and recording a year-on-year increase of 31 percent on 2016’s $3.069 billion, according to a report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
This figure came about thanks to Fraport Greece’s investment in the utilization of 14 regional airports, a process concluded in April 2017. That transaction gained a special reference in the “World Investment Report 2018,” along with the acquisition of 67 percent of Piraeus Port Authority by China’s Cosco.
There was also a significant rise in the total FDI stock in Greece, as at end-2017 the sum of foreign capital invested amounted to $32.37 billion, up from $25.17 billion at end-2016. This rise is not only seen in absolute figures but also in gross domestic product terms: The FDI stock amounted to 17.3 percent of GDP last year, based on the provisional estimate of the Hellenic Statistical Authority for a GDP of 187.1 billion, against a 14.1 percent rate in 2016.
The report recorded that in 2017 there were 16 mergers and acquisitions of Greek enterprises through foreign capital that amounted to $2.04 billion.
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