By: Staff Writer
July 3, 2026
The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) in a new report on foreign direct investment (FDI) in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) said that FDI inflows to the region in 2025 rose by 14 percent to US $1.6 trillion.
The report, “Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2026: navigating the new global context,” said: “In 2025, global FDI inflows rose by 14% on the previous year to a total of US$ 1.6 trillion, driven by increased investment in developed economies, with particularly large movements in some European countries.
“This global landscape, characterized by increased capital inflows into central countries, a sustained decline in investment inflows into China and a mixed performance across developing economies, is part of a new configuration of cross-border investment that has been taking shape over the last five years.”
The report also said: “Against this background, the general picture in 2025 was one of declining investment project announcements around the world. FDI project announcements totalled US$ 1.35 trillion, a 1.9 percent decrease from 2024, while the number of announcements was down by 15.7 percent.
“The existence of megaprojects in the communications sector (the construction of data centres) and in semiconductor manufacturing explains the high total value. If communications and semiconductors are excluded, the value of announced projects actually declined by 19 percent in 2025.”
The report added: “Thus, the communications sector emerged as the leading sector for project announcements worldwide, overtaking the renewable energy sector, which had led in terms of the value of projects announced between 2019 and 2024, and the coal, oil and gas sector, which had led in the 2010s.
“This increase in megaprojects in capital-intensive sectors has led to a gradual decline in the promised impact of the projects announced on job creation.”
Adding: “In recent years, and particularly since the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and the escalation of geopolitical tensions, there has been a growing emphasis on considerations of national security, economic security, supply chain resilience and technological sovereignty in the regulation of international investment.
“One of the main manifestations of this trend has been the rapid expansion of mechanisms for screening inward FDI on national security grounds, particularly in developed economies.
“A key feature of the more recent regimes is the broadening of the concept of national security, which is no longer limited to defence in the strict sense, but incorporates notions of technological sovereignty, the protection of critical infrastructure, control over sensitive data, supply chain resilience and intangible assets linked to artificial intelligence and other advanced technologies.
“Latin America and the Caribbean is still largely untouched by this global trend towards the adoption and expansion of formal investment screening regimes on national security grounds.”