Despite its obvious financial advantages, Foreign Direct Investment has also been described as an "expensive" and "risky" international growth strategy. Other things being equal, why is FDI expensive and risky? Compare the risks involved with FDI to the risks involved with exporting and licensing.
             There is first no shared risk with any investment partner when FDI is used as a strategy for gaining entrance to a new market. FDI is further made highly risky when the local and national investment government-based guidelines and restrictions are taken into account. This can get even more complex if the FDI-based project is an a nation that has a relatively high corruption rating with Transparency International. Take for example making an investment in the Ukraine, where FDI would be seen as a symbol of exceptional wealth on the part of Ukrainian officials, some of the most corrupt in Eastern Europe. Inevitably companies with large FDI investments in nations such as these would be prone to bribery and graft, and to a large extent merciless to governments that are permeated with corruption. FDI must be a strategy in only the more transparent and corruption-free countries.
             Do you think the establishment of a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) would be beneficial for the two most advance economies in the Americas, the US and Canada? How would the forming of an FTAA impact the economies of the other countries in South and Central American? Be as concise as possible.
             The development of an FTAA would be highly valuable for more advanced economies as it would reduce the impediments to more fluid global trade. This concept cannot be taken only in the context of just the Americas; it must be looked at from a global perspective as an enabler of greater transaction velocities throughout global markets. Developing FTAA locations throughout South and Central America is also critical as these nations specifically are ideologically de...