MEXICO CITY, Mexico, July 7, 2026 – Mexico returned to the world’s top 10 destinations for foreign direct investment in 2025, but the ranking comes with a warning: companies already operating in the country are still investing in Mexico, while new project announcements have cooled sharply.
The country received about $41 billion in foreign direct investment, or FDI, last year, placing it tenth globally, according to the World Investment Report 2026 released by UN Trade and Development. The figure moved Mexico back into the top 10 after several years just outside that group and confirmed the country’s weight in North American manufacturing, services, and export-linked production.
The headline number is strong. The underlying mix is more complicated.
UNCTAD found that Mexico’s FDI inflows rose from about $38 billion in 2024 to $41 billion in 2025, supported by its role in regional production networks and continued investment in services and manufacturing. But the same report said the value of announced greenfield projects in Mexico fell from about $44 billion to $24 billion. Greenfield projects are new factories, plants, logistics centers, and other capacity investments that often indicate whether companies are expanding their physical footprint.
That split matters because Mexico’s nearshoring story has often been judged by the promise of new factories moving closer to the United States. The 2025 data suggest something narrower: foreign companies are not leaving Mexico, but many are moving more carefully before committing to large new projects.
Expansión reported a return to the top 10 on Tuesday, citing UNCTAD’s warning that Mexico remains well-positioned for nearshoring but faces weaker momentum in new projects. The added context from the full report is that Mexico’s ranking improved during a year when global investment became more concentrated in a smaller number of countries and sectors, particularly artificial intelligence infrastructure, data centers, semiconductors, oil and gas, and selected strategic industries.
The Mexican government’s own 2025 FDI figures show why the headline total needs to be read carefully. The Secretaría de Economía reported $40.871 billion in FDI for 2025, a record annual figure. Of that total, reinvested earnings accounted for about 67.7%, new investments about 18%, and intercompany accounts the rest.
Reinvestment is not a weak signal. It shows that established foreign companies continue to see Mexico as a place worth operating and expanding from. But it is different from a surge of new arrivals. A year dominated by reinvested earnings says more about the confidence of companies already in Mexico than about a broad wave of fresh foreign capital entering the country for the first time.
Manufacturing-linked nearshoring is most visible in industrial corridors in northern Mexico, the Bajío, and parts of central Mexico. Coastal economies such as Puerto Vallarta feel the investment climate differently, through tourism, real estate confidence, infrastructure, aviation, construction costs, and the peso, not through factory relocation alone.
UNCTAD also noted that tourism-related investment in Latin America and the Caribbean remains concentrated, with Mexico and the Dominican Republic accounting for a large share of announced tourism greenfield investment in recent years.
The biggest cloud over new investment remains trade certainty. The report pointed to uncertainty surrounding the review of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, known in Mexico as T-MEC, as one factor weighing on investment decisions. PVDN has previously reported on how Mexico’s nearshoring strategy runs through USMCA and why the 2026 review has become central to investment planning.
That uncertainty increased last week when the United States Trade Representative said the U.S. did not agree to renew USMCA in its current form. The agreement remains in force, but the decision starts a period of annual reviews unless the three countries agree on an extension. A new U.S.-Mexico negotiating round is expected the week of July 20.
That does not mean T-MEC has ended. It means investors that depend on North American rules of origin, tariff treatment, and long-term supply-chain planning have another reason to wait before announcing major projects. That is especially relevant to the automotive, electronics, machinery, logistics, and advanced manufacturing sectors, where investment decisions are often made years before production.
Mexico’s first-quarter 2026 data showed that foreign investment has remained resilient this year. PVDN reported in May that Mexico hit a first-quarter foreign investment record, with strong reinvested earnings and gains in key sectors. The issue is not whether capital is still arriving. It is whether enough of that capital is turning into new productive capacity.
UNCTAD’s reading of Latin America points to the same tension. Regional FDI inflows rose in 2025, but announced greenfield investment values fell by about one-third. In Mexico, the decline was sharper. The report said nearshoring remains a structural opportunity for the region, but in 2025 it saw selective, delayed investment rather than a broad surge in new project announcements.
The top 10 ranking is still a meaningful win. It shows that the country remains one of the few developing economies large enough, connected enough, and industrially integrated enough to compete for global capital at scale. It also shows that established foreign companies are not treating Mexico as a short-term bet.
