Ljubljana, 19 October (STA) - The stock of foreign direct investments in Slovenia stood at EUR 13.7bn in 2017, having expanded by 5.4% over the year before, well below the average annual increase of over 11% since 1994. Austrian firms remain by far the biggest investors.
The increase was driven by equity capital and reinvested earnings, shows the annual report on foreign direct investments released by the central bank on Friday.
Equity capital transactions amounted to EUR 502m, down from EUR 938m in the year before, while reinvested profits were at EUR 340m, more than EUR 200m lower than in 2016.
On the other side of the ledger, debt instruments reduced the FDI stock by almost EUR 150m.
Austrian firms accounted for more than a quarter of all FDI stock (25.6%), followed by corporates from Luxembourg (11.4%), Switzerland (10.4%), Germany (8.4%), Italy (8.3%) and the Netherlands (7.8%).
The value of Austrian FDI has been rising steadily and increased by well over EUR 300m last year, but in the long term its share of incoming FDI stock has been declining, having dropped by almost nine percentage points from 2013.
On the other hand, Luxembourg, a tax-friendly jurisdiction where many multinationals operate from, saw its share almost quadruple from 2013.
On a year-on-year basis, Russia stands out with a near trebling of FDI stock to EUR 176m.
As a share of GDP, foreign investments in Slovenia remain moderate: they accounted for under 32% of GDP in 2017, up nine percentage points since 2008 but still 25 points below the EU average.
Outbound investments by Slovenian firms meanwhile stood at EUR 5.9bn, a 2.9% year-on-year increase.
The bulk of Slovenian investments are in the former Yugoslavia: 30.7% in Croatia, 16% in Serbia, 8% in Bosnia-Herzegovina and 6.1% in Macedonia.
The only non-Balkan country among the top five destinations is Russia, where 6.6% of Slovenian outward FDI is located.