Affiliations: [a] Statistics Department, Bank of Portugal (BoP), Portugal | [b] External Statistics and Sector Accounts Division, Directorate General Statistics, European Central Bank (ECB) | [c] Statistics and Research Support, Monetary and Economic Department, Bank for International Settlements, Basel, Switzerland | [d] Secretariat of the Irving Fisher Committee on Central Bank Statistics (IFC), Basel, Switzerland
Correspondence:
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Corresponding author: Bruno Tissot, Head of Statistics and Research Support, Monetary and Economic Department and Head of the Secretariat of the Irving Fisher Committee on Central Bank Statistics (IFC) Bank for International Settlements, Centralbahnplatz 2, CH-4002 Basel, Switzerland. Tel.: +41 61 280 8294; Fax: +41 61 280 91 00; Mobile: +41 76 350 8294; E-mail: bruno.tissot@bis.org.
Note: [1] The views expressed here are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the BoP, the ECB, the BIS or the IFC. This article draws on the various presentations made on the occasion of the IFC Conference on external statistics, co-organised with the BoP and the ECB in Lisbon, Portugal in February 2020. The proceedings were published in the IFC Bulletin series [40].We very much thank P Feuvrier, B Gruić, G Quirós-Romero and P van de Ven and for their helpful comments and suggestions.
Abstract: Globalisation is posing important challenges to external statistics, which have been reinforced in recent decades by rapid digital innovation, the complexity and limited transparency of multinational corporate structures, and the increased importance of global financial centres. Examples of such challenges include the fragmentation of global production chains and the changing nature of foreign direct investment. One fundamental question is whether the multipurpose analytical tool provided by external statistics should be simply adapted or radically transformed to address these issues. The experience of central banks shows that a number of alternative ways can be effectively developed in the medium term to adapt the current external statistics framework, especially by: collecting supplementary data; enhancing the infrastructure supporting compilation; focusing the analysis on large and global corporate groups; presenting more granular data for the aggregates currently compiled; and revisiting the concept of foreign direct investment.
Keywords: Globalisation, foreign direct investment, multinational enterprises, public policy, international statistical standards
