India continues to stay out of Kearney’s 25-country 2021 FDI Confidence Index, US tops

India continued to stay out of the Kearney FDI Confidence Index for the second year in a row, a report by the global consultancy firm showed Wednesday with only three developing economies- China, the UAE, and Brazil-making it in the top 25.

However, investors are “likely monitoring closely” India’s data privacy bill with implications for data rules, it said. India was ranked 16th in the 2019 list, while it occupied 11th spot the year prior. In 2017, India made the top ten and was ranked eighth.

“India has been deliberating a data privacy bill with implications for data rules that investors are likely monitoring closely.


As per the report, investors in Asia are particularly concerned about data protection regulations, with 43 % citing high costs associated with data privacy rules versus 41 % of investors in the Americas and 38 % in Europe.

Kearney's 2021 FDI Confidence Index reveals high level of risk aversion. It is an annual survey of global business executives that ranks the markets likely to attract the most investment in the next three years.

The US retained its top position for investment attractiveness and was followed by Canada, Germany, the UK and Japan.

This year's rankings point to continued apprehension and uncertainty about how quickly the global economy will recover post-Covid. In addition to the fall in confidence about the economy, most of the overall scores for the top-25 countries have fallen compared with previous years. Only 57 % of investors are optimistic about the three-year global economic outlook, which is much lower than the corresponding figure last year of 72 % (prior to and at the onset of the pandemic).