Hanoi (VNA) – The flows of foreign direct investment (FDI) in Malaysia fell 12.77 percent year-on-year to 41 billion ringgit (10.09 billion USD) in 2017, after reaching a new high of 47 billion ringgit in the previous year, the Department of Statistics of Malaysia reported.
The FDI flows last year was mainly channeled in services sector (48.2 percent), particularly in real estate, financial and insurance or takaful (Islamic insurance); information and communication activities.
The mining and quarrying industry (31.2 percent) was the second contributor, followed by the manufacturing sector (15.7 percent).
Asia was the main driver for Malaysia's FDI, accounting for 63.5 percent of the total, followed by Europe and Africa.
Within Asia, China's Hong Kong remained as the prominent investor with 7.5 billion ringgit, while China (6.9 billion ringgit) overtook Singapore as the second largest contributor.
Meanwhile, Malaysia's direct investment abroad (DIA) also registered lower net outflows of 24.9 billion ringgit last year as compared with 33.2 billion ringgit in 2016.
According to the department, the investment abroad was also channeled mainly in services (73.6 percent), followed by mining and quarrying (12 percent) and manufacturing (7.4 percent) sectors.
Investment in the services sector was primarily in financial and insurance or takaful; and real estate activities.
In terms of region, Asia was the top destination for Malaysia's DIA flows, contributing half of the investment with 13.7 billion ringgit, followed by Americas and Europe.
For Asia region, net DIA flows were mainly to Singapore and Indonesia, while Turkmenistan replaced India as the third largest destination.
The Malaysian Government expected that the country’s economy will expand by 5.5-6 percent this year as forecasted by the central bank of Malaysia.
Minister of Finance Lim Guan Eng recently affirmed that Malaysia is an open and diversified economy so it could grow by at least 5 percent in the next few years despite adverse impacts from the global trade war.-VNA
VNA