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What is keeping foreign money out of Iran’s stock exchanges?

Beyond the remaining US primary sanctions, a plethora of issues within Iran is effectively acting to hold back badly needed foreign investment.
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TEHRAN, Iran — According to the UN Conference on Trade and Development’s 2015 World Investment Report, Iran saw troubling changes in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in 2014. FDI inflow dropped by a third, while FDI outflow more than tripled; in dollar terms, Iran received merely $2.1 billion in inward investment and lost $600 million outward. Given that these figures include Foreign Portfolio Investment (FPI), they are disappointing.

The obstacles in the way of a greater influx of foreign money into Iranian capital markets can be divided into two distinct categories: domestic and external, with the former of far greater significance than the latter.

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