Trade Horizons’ Market Entry Blog

Global FDI is forecast to decrease further as countries enter into recessions caused by high cost of living, global food shortages, inflation, rising energy prices and massive national debt. The Bank of England expects a UK recession of 5 quarters long with a retraction of 2% on the economy starting later in 2022. Unctad says the global FDI decline is likely to continue until 2023. Global FDI flows in the second quarter of 2022 were down 31% on the first quarter. Investor uncertainty is very high now leading to a reduction in investing.

From October 24th to 27th, 2022, Trade Horizons conducted a business development trip for German SMEs in the field of e-mobility & autonomous driving to the West Midlands, UK's center of electromobility. The trip is part of the Market Development Program arranged by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK).

International clients increasingly question the need to undertake the commercial due diligence process when addressing a potential distributor partnership agreement. They tend to skip the due diligence process and go straight to the preparation of the transaction contract, arguing that it is time consuming and costly, and they can rely on publicly available information on the target’s business as well as with the inclusion of broad indemnities in the transaction documents.

Global FDI is forecast to decrease further as countries enter into recessions caused by high cost of living, global food shortages, inflation, rising energy prices and massive national debt. The Bank of England expects a UK recession of 5 quarters long with a retraction of 2% on the economy starting later in 2022. Unctad says the global FDI decline is likely to continue until 2023. Global FDI flows in the second quarter of 2022 were down 31% on the first quarter. Investor uncertainty is very high now leading to a reduction in investing.

Japan currently manufactures Toyota, Daihatsu, Honda and Mitsubishi in Indonesia. Recently there has been a drive by Indonesia to attract car manufacturers to the country. For example, it hosted Tesla founder Elon Musk recently but he declined to comment on his visit. Indonesia is the worlds fourth most populous nation but only 4 out of every hundred people are car owners in country. The Indonesian automobile manufacturers association says that vehicle sales were up 19% in September 2022. Citroen is the latest manufacturer to announce operations in Indonesia with first models due to roll out in 2023.

Singapore is the second easiest country to do business in according to the OECD’s Ease of Doing Business Report and had always held top spot until being overtaken by New Zealand in 2018. It is the third smallest country in Asia and is 8th in the world attracting FDI, the most in Asia relative to GDP. In 2022 Singapore so far has attracted $US74 billion FDI which represents 21% of its GDP. Regarding investor protection Singapore ranks highly compared to Asia, the US and Germany.