ANKARA: While Turkish investors have been focused on Europe over the last few years, this year Asia was the focal point with investment on the continent reaching $2.4 billion compared to Europe’s $1.9 billion. European investment, which is undergoing tough economic times, declined by 10.5 percent and investments in Asia accounted for 51 percent of the total investments made abroad.
According to data from the Central Bank of Turkey, investments totaling $4.7 billion were made in 2014 with Asia accounting for $2.4 billion of these investments within the first 10 months of the year, tripling the amount made in 2013. Despite the decline, 40.7 percent of the investments were made in European countries, followed by the United States with 7.4 percent and African countries with 0.8 percent. Azerbaijan became the country that attracted the highest level of direct investments between January and October 2014 with investments increasing fourfold and reaching $1.9 billion while this figure was around $357 million in 2014. The Netherlands followed Azerbaijan with $752 million and the U.K. drew around $420 million in investments.
Due to the tensions in Ukraine, Russia suffered as a result of the sanctions applied by the U.S. and EU countries, and there was a 21 percent decline in investments made in Russia by Turkish entrepreneurs within the first 10 months of 2014. While investments worth $81 million were made in Russia in 2013, this year the figure dropped to $64 million.
Moreover, investments made in Ukraine dropped from $17 million in 2013 to $9 million in 2014 Investors did not invest in Denmark, Poland, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Serbia, Libya, Ethiopia, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Singapore or Taiwan in 2014, although Turkish companies did invest in these countries during the first 10 months of 2013. In the same time period, Bulgaria had the highest decrease in investments by 92.3 percent, India became the second with 90 percent and Austria was the third with 84.7 percent.
