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Foreign Investment. By activity branches

Foreign Investment. By activity branches Catalonia. 2020
Value Variation (%)
Total 3,121.4 -18.9
Agriculture, livestock, forestry and fishing 42.4 301.2
Mining industries 0.0 -61.0
Manufacturing industries 880.5 -25.7
Electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning 3.4 28.3
Water, sewers and waste management 0.3 -100.0
Construction 64.3 -72.2
Wholesale and retail trade 697.7 31.4
Transport and storage 35.0 -42.7
Hotel and food services 132.0 212.4
Information and communications 556.6 225.7
Financial activities and insurance 314.2 145.4
Real estate activities 206.6 -57.2
Professional, scientific and technical activities 100.8 -47.5
Administrative and support service activities 74.0 12.6
Education 7.0 77.0
Health and social services 0.1 -73.0
Artistic, recreational and entertainment activities 4.6 -94.2
Other services 1.9 77.8
Units: Millions of euros.
Source: Idescat, based on data from the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Tourism.
Note: Provisional data.
Foreign Investment. By activity branches Spain. 2020
Value Variation (%)
Total 27,190.2 9.4
Agriculture, livestock, forestry and fishing 185.4 -31.2
Mining industries 20.0 -56.5
Manufacturing industries 3,463.9 -34.5
Electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning 1,343.7 37.2
Water, sewers and waste management 39.6 -94.2
Construction 3,000.4 169.8
Wholesale and retail trade 1,638.6 4.2
Transport and storage 1,695.7 244.0
Hotel and food services 250.5 -48.2
Information and communications 5,470.1 187.0
Financial activities and insurance 7,154.7 38.8
Real estate activities 1,243.7 -53.3
Professional, scientific and technical activities 544.6 -76.2
Administrative and support service activities 386.0 -46.9
Education 160.3 -77.2
Health and social services 543.3 85.8
Artistic, recreational and entertainment activities 34.6 -69.6
Other services 15.1 -79.7
Units: Millions of euros.
Source: Idescat, based on data from the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Tourism.
Note: Provisional data.

Last update: April 3, 2024.

Methodological note

The definition of direct foreign investment basically follows the recommendations of the International Monetary Fund (5th Balance of Payments Manual) and the OCDE (Benchmark Definition).

The data is based on that declared by investors pursuant to Act 19/2003, dated 4 July, on the legal system for capital movements and economic transactions abroad and measures to prevent money laundering, and the regulations that further implement it (Royal Decree 664/1999, Ministerial Order dated 28 May 2001 and Ministerial Ruling dated 21 February 2002). They do not include financing between companies, reinvested profits (save in the case of capitalisation of loans and/or profits) and investment in real estate.

Gross investment includes direct investment declared to the Foreign Investment Registry (FIR) of non-residents which entails:

  • holdings in unlisted Spanish companies
  • holdings of more than 10% in listed Spanish companies
  • setting up or expansion of branches of foreign companies
  • other forms of investment in organisations or contracts registered in Spain (foundations, cooperatives, economic interest groupings), in which invested capital is greater than EUR 3,005,060.52

Excluded from the data are foreign share holding companies (ETVEs). ETVEs are holding companies set up in Spain whose sole purpose is to hold shares in companies located abroad.

Data by geographical areas refer to the immediate country of origin of the investment. Immediate country means the place where the direct holder of the investment is resident.

Foreign investment is obtained from official data published by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Tourism from the Statistics on Foreign Investment in Spain and Spanish Investment Abroad. The data are provisional, given that in the corresponding quarterly updates, information referring to previous periods is modified as a result of operations which were declared in the last period but carried out prior to this.

For each new period published, Idescat updates and reviews the information published by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Tourism for the last 10 years.