Serbia has for the second time in a row emerged as one of the leading foreign investors in Montenegro’s economy and ranked second in terms of direct investment in January-August 2025, behind only Turkey, the Serbian Economist reports.
According to preliminary data from the Central Bank of Montenegro, the total inflow of foreign direct investment (FDI) for the first eight months of 2025 was 595.58 million euros, which is 3.46% more than in the same period last year. Net investment inflows reached €314.39 million, down 4.75 per cent year-on-year.
Of this, €376.83 million (63.3% of total inflows) came from partial investments, mainly in real estate (around €308.9 million, +8.4%), while investments in companies and banks declined to less than €68 million. Around €197.1 million (33.1%) was attributable to intercompany debt.
In terms of structure by country, Turkey was the leader with EUR 92.2 million, of which more than half was intracompany debt and around EUR 35.5 million was property purchases. In second place is Serbia with 91.84 million euros, with Serbian investors investing about 60.9 million euros in properties in Montenegro. Next are Germany (43.5 million euros), the United States (41.6 million euros) and Cyprus (about 40 million euros).
The United Arab Emirates invested about 30.7 million euros, roughly equally divided between real estate and intercompany financing.
Russia, previously among the largest investors in Montenegro, has dropped to seventh position.
Ukraine is not among the top 5 foreign investors in Montenegro in terms of direct investment, but the Ukrainian presence in the country’s economy is gradually expanding. According to the tax and customs authorities of Montenegro, only in 2022 Ukrainian citizens founded about 200 companies, which is about 3% of the total number of new firms created by foreigners for the year.
Earlier it was reported that against the background of the war and business relocation to Montenegro, the number of Ukrainian citizens who obtained temporary and permanent residence permits increased noticeably, while Ukrainian companies mainly operate in the service, IT and small business sectors.