The Central Bank (BCRD) reported that preliminary figures for the first semester of 2024 show that foreign direct investment (FDI) reached US$2,374.3 million, increasing 0.9% over the same period of the previous year.
The flows evidence the confidence of foreign investors in the Dominican Republic as a destination for their investments, a country that since 2022 is the second largest recipient of FDI in the region, behind Mexico, according to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
The result is in line with year-end projections for FDI to exceed US$4.5 billion, he says.
The sectoral distribution shows that more than half of FDI inflows went to the tourism and energy sectors. It is important to highlight the evolution of the energy sector, which expanded its share within FDI from 7.5% in the first half of 2019 to 25.5% in the first six months of 2024, mainly due to Dominican state incentives directed towards renewable energies. Another relevant sector for FDI has been real estate, whose development is linked to the country’s tourism development, especially after recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic.
The institution points out that in addition to the increase in FDI flows (0.9%) and remittances (4.4%), the Dominican economy also achieved total exports of more than US$6.8 billion in the first half of 2024, an increase of 2.3% over the same period of 2023. Within exports, gold exports increased by 10 %, driven by improvements in production and by the historic price levels recorded for the precious mineral in international markets. Of the total exports, those from free trade zones were close to US$4.2 billion, increasing by 6.6% year-on-year, which augurs that the sector will close the year with record export figures.
Likewise, the BCRD reports that tourism revenues between January and June totaled some US$5.7 billion, some US$700 million (14.1%) above revenues for the same period in 2023. The result was mainly due to the increase in tourist arrivals during the first half of the year, which reached 5.3 million visitors, including air and cruise ship passengers.
It should be noted that foreign exchange income generated by FDI, remittances, tourism, exports of goods and other services, totaled approximately US$21.9 billion in January-June 2024, which implies an increase of US$1.327 billion with respect to the same period of 2023, which contributes to the relative stability of the exchange rate. Everything points to the fact that by the end of the year the country would receive foreign exchange income for about US$43 billion.
Source:Arecoa.com
