MEXICO CITY, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Foreign direct investment (FDI) in Mexico in 2016 was down 5.8 percent to 26.738 billion U.S. dollars, according to the preliminary statistics from the Ministry of Economy on Wednesday.
While these numbers are still preliminary, the Ministry wrote that "the largest part of the reductions mentioned can be explained by loans and/or debt reduction between subsidiaries and their holding groups, common operations between companies."
The statement said that FDI in 2016 came from 3,543 companies with foreign capital, 38.9 percent of which came from the U.S., 10.7 percent from Spain, 7.5 percent from Israel, 6.3 percent from Canada, while 67 other countries also participated.
And 37.8 of the FDI received in 2016 was destined for new investments, the Ministry pointed out.
The great majority of the FDI went to the manufacturing sector (61.3 percent), followed by financial services, transportation, mining, electrical energy, water and gas.
One of the largest operations in 2016 saw Mexican pharmaceutical firm RIMSA bought by Israel's TEVA for 2.3 billion U.S. dollars.
These numbers were revised by Mexico's central bank but they "only consider investments and formally registered with the National Registry of Foreign Investments. This is why (the numbers) are preliminary and will be updated over the following quarters," read the statement.
A single purchase
