Economy & Business - July 2004

As we noted last month, this year is shaping up as a much better one for the region, economically-speaking, than most people expected. The problem is that foreign investors are not rewarding this achievement with new investment. Instead, they are putting their money in Asia. The most graphic illustration of this was comparing the most recent foreign direct investment figures for China and Brazil. China received US$7.97bn in actual FDI disbursements in June, while Brazil got a measly US$260m in May.