Phenomenon of Direct Investments that are not Associated with

Abstract

The article is devoted to the review of current scientific research on foreign direct investment (FDI), which is not related to “classical” TNCs. It is shown that a separate study of “born global” firms from TNCs is required mainly because of the need to adjust the theoretical concepts that explain the phenomenon of TNCs. The separate study of FDI of sovereign investment funds and investors in foreign real estate is useful mainly due to the applied tasks of state regulation of such investments. Non-standard FDI can also include investments by pseudo-TNCs, with round-tripping FDI through offshore and similar jurisdictions, as well as FDI by private equity funds. At the same time, pseudo-TNCs and private equity funds can be studied within the framework of the established paradigm of TNCs analysis. Therefore, relatively small amount of publications are devoted to such topics. The majority of publications on non-typical FDI appeared only in the 2000s, which illustrates the blurring of the usual boundaries of FDI. Russian scientists are still focused on studying TNCs. This is partly due to the fact that a new direction has also emerged in such analysis – the study of TNCs from developing and post-socialist countries, which are often difficult to attribute to “classic” Western multinational investors. In this aspect, Russian and generally post-Soviet TNCs turned out to be interesting material for analysis at least in the first 10–15 years of the 21st century. However, the analysis of new FDI players is important for Russia for a number of reasons: 1) creating comfortable conditions for the import of capital to Russia while respecting national interests (FDI of sovereign funds, especially Chinese and Arab); 2) encouraging forms of capital export that contribute to improving the position of Russia in the international division of labor (primarily FDI in modern industries of small “born global” firms); 3) limiting excessive capital exports (FDI of pseudo-TNCs and individuals).