Foreign Direct Investments from Emerging Markets: The Challenges Ahead

摘要

Emerging economies, such as India and China, are well-known to be recipients of foreign direct investments (FDI) from developed countries. However, in recent years, a new phenomenon appears and keeps intensifying, attracting considerable attention among politicians as well as academics: the outward FDI (OFDI) from emerging markets. Statistics from UNCTAD confirm this new trend in international business. As pointed out in the World Investment Report 2009, developing countries emerge as large investors accounting for about 16% of the global FDI outflows in 2008 (UNCTAD 2009: 15-16). Further, the economic and financial crisis of 2008, that has mainly hurt developed countries, has contributed to this dramatic change in the investment landscape, promoting the entry of new players on the global scene.