Foreign direct investment in Russia growing steadily amid economic resurgence

25 Jan, 2018 12:26

Russia is becoming more attractive to foreign investors, who are ready to pour more money into the economy every year, according to Economic Development Minister Maksim Oreshkin.

“We see a positive trend in foreign direct investment in the past several years. This volume exceeded $20-25 billion in 2017,” he said at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday.

The biggest winners are foreign companies that invested in Russia in the last few years despite the financial crisis and sanctions, Oreshkin said.

“The past years saw a turbulent period in the geopolitical sense, which affected the economy. The companies that invested in those years are now reaping the good results of these decisions,” the Russian minister said.

“If we look at the statistics, we will see a number of major transactions, which proves that the investment climate is improving.”

With a $4 trillion GDP in terms of Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) Russia is the sixth-largest economy in the world after China, the United States, India, Japan and Germany.

Since 1999, Russia has enjoyed a 30-fold increase in foreign currency reserves, public debt has shrunk to 17.2 percent of GDP compared to over 92 percent 18 years ago.

The total value of assets in the Russian banking system has risen 24-fold to $1.43 trillion. GDP per capita almost tripled to $27,900 to become the largest among BRICS countries.

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