While European investors lead the charge into Serbia’s banking sector, companies from across the Atlantic are taking a leading role in the real sector. “Americans are by far the biggest investors,” says Jasna Matic, director of SIEPA, the investment promotion agency. US companies have brought roughly one-third of the €3.5bn in foreign investment that Serbia has reeled in since 2002.
The floodgates opened with two deals during the real sector privatisation boom of 2003, a season of sell-offs that exceeded reformers’ expectations and made Serbia’s privatisation revenues the envy of the western Balkans.
