Almost half of foreign direct investment into Britain went to London in 2019 before the Covid pandemic struck, according to official data.
The capital, a global financial centre, received more than three times FDI than the UK’s south-east, which attracted the second highest amount.
Between 2015 and 2019 the value of FDI in London rose to £661bn from £416bn, outstripping other regions such as Wales and Northern Ireland where investment was flat or fell, said the Office for National Statistics.
Scotland recorded the third highest FDI position in the UK with £86bn, while Wales received £19bn.
For every job in London, there was £108,656 of FDI stock in 2019 and £39,727 for each one in the south-east in 2019. The average for the other English regions plus Northern Ireland was £20,801 for each job.
“The trends between 2015 and 2019 for inward FDI earnings across city regions were mixed; six of the 16 city regions observed upward trends over that period,” the ONS said.
