Approved FDI pledges surge in 2nd quarter

MANILA, Philippines — Committed foreign direct investments rose to P49.6 billion in the second quarter, the Philippine Statistics Authority reported Thursday.

The FDI pledges approved by the country’s key investment promotion agencies, or IPAs, from April to June this year was higher than P30.9 billion recorded in the same period in 2018.

The second-quarter result brought last semester’s approved FDI commitments to P95.6 billion, or more than double the P45.2 billion in the previous year.

Foreign investment commitments are different from the actual capital inflows separately tracked by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas for balance of payments purposes. 

The seven IPAs covered by the PSA’s report are Board of Investments, Clark Development Corporation, Philippine Economic Zone Authority, Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority, Authority of the Freeport Area of Bataan, BOI-Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao and Cagayan Economic Zone Authority.

Excluding BOI-ARMM where no report was submitted to the PSA, the total approved foreign investments by the remaining six IPAs in the second quarter was 60.2% higher than the comparable period in the previous year.

The top three prospective investing countries in the second quarter are Singapore (P36.2 billion), Japan (P4 billion) and the Netherlands (P1.3 billion).

Meanwhile, the combined investment pledges by Filipino and foreign nationals totalled P107 billion last quarter, down by 6.7% from last year’s P114.7 billion. 

If they materialize, foreign and local investments pledged in the second quarter are expected to generate 30,135 jobs, 32.3% lower than the projected employment of 44,526 jobs in the same period in 2018.