FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT AND REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN SLOVAKIA

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) has introduced competition features into international economic relations. Significant foreign investment flow represents a healthy economic environment in the country. Especially European countries that have become members of the EU recently, countries in the middle and east of Europe, have had the tendency to compete to attract and acquire foreign investors. Slovakia since its early existence after the Czechoslovakian split has taken a path that has directed it to the most dynamic countries in the middle and Eastern Europe. Slovakia with its reforms in the field of taxes, pensions, Labour Code and health care has become a country with entrepreneurial environment offering permanent opportunities for global companies in the processing industries and in sectors with value added higher rate. From the beginning of the entrance of FDI in Slovakia they show significant regional inequality. The aim of the contribution is to evaluate the regional disectment FDI in Slovakia and its influence on the development of the regions. Correlation and regression analysis are employed to asses the impact of foreign direct investment flow on selected macroeconomic indicators (the GDP growth index, unemployment rate).