Foreign Direct Investments Into The Countries In Southeast Europe: Do The Countries In The Region Invest In Each Other And To Which Extent?

The aim of this research is to determine how much the countries in Southeast Europe invest in each other. Namely, the existing research is not focused on the analysis of where foreign direct investments (FDI) in the countries of Southeast Europe come from – from other countries of Southeast Europe or from other countries? Consequently, this paper focuses on the countries in Southeast Europe in order to explore the structure of FDI, as well as their interrelationship. In addition, the aim of the paper is to construct a FDI index to establish how their cooperation in this area has changed over time. The results indicate that FDI in the countries of the region mostly come from EU member states, while interregional direct investment is still relatively underrepresented. Nevertheless, the FDI index based on the foreign direct investments stock indicates a continuous increase in regional cooperation. Cooperation between the countries in Southeast Europe, although nominally low, achieves significantly higher growth rates than the cooperation of this region with the rest of the world, which indicates the region's interest in deepening mutual cooperation.