Finance dominates investment into the UK
FINANCIAL services have made up the vast majority of international investment into the UK since the 2009, according to a breakdown released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) yesterday.
The figures showed that between 2009 and 2012, foreign direct investment (FDI) in financial services made up the overwhelming bulk of growth, counting for 30.8 percentage points of the 37.5 per cent net increase during the period.
The next most significant sector, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, added only 3.2 percentage points to the expansion.
Most parts of the economy added less than a percentage point in either direction to the boost, but transportation and storage reduced the total increase by 1.9 percentage points, and retail, wholesale and repairs cut the growth by 8.6 points.
Despite the more rapid economic growth in other parts of the world, 91 per cent of investment in the UK still comes from the Americas and Europe, while more than four-fifths of investment by UK companies internationally goes to the same areas. The proportion of FDI going from Britain to Asia nearly doubled from six to 11 per cent between 1999 and 2012.
Despite a 76 per cent rise in investment coming into the UK between 2002 and 2012, the country’s net FDI position was smaller at £151.6bn two years ago than it was in 2002.
A decade earlier the country had a £292.1bn net investment position, but the ONS stressed that the change was down to a slightly faster increase in UK investment abroad than the other way round.