The amount of new foreign investment deals is on track to double this year, according to a report by Dunia Frontier Consultants, which specializes in emerging markets. In the first half of this year, Iraq attracted $45.6 billion in foreign investment, about $3 billion more than all of last year, the report says.
The rush of investment this year reflects a new confidence in Iraq’s stability and a reduction in risk, analysts say. “This is money talking,” said Campbell Harvey, professor of finance at Duke University in North Carolina.
U.S. companies have been slow to get in on the investment opportunities in Iraq, even lagging behind countries that opposed the war, such as France.
Last year, French companies represented 9.9% of the foreign investment in Iraq, compared with 4.7% for American companies, the Dunia report says.
“U.S. companies tend to be more risk-averse than their European counterparts and certainly their regional counterparts,” said Nicholas Skibiak, emerging markets director at Dunia.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has been urging American companies to consider investments in Iraq and pushing the U.S. government to more aggressively represent the interests of American businesses in the country.
“We have invested a lot in Iraq over the last decade in blood and treasure, and it is really unfortunate if we permit our trading partners to sort of capitalize on that investment to our disadvantage,” said Lionel Johnson, vice president of Middle East affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
