Foreign direct investment ("FDI") is an important part of the global economy: OECD data indicates that there was USD$1,426 billion of global FDI in 2019. In recent years, governments around the world have shown an increasing desire to scrutinise and, if considered necessary, intervene in transactions involving FDI, motivated by a number of geo-political factors including rising protectionism, concern about cyber-security threats, and more recently the need to protect critical industries in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. There are exceptions – notably, China, Chile and the UAE have all relaxed their FDI rules to encourage foreign investment. However, the general trend is for governments to seek to exercise greater control over flows of FDI into their jurisdictions.