Numbers That Crunch President Trump

President Trump often says we’re the hottest country in the world, seeing trillions in investment. His number keeps rising while the Department of Commerce just restated  $19.2 trillion . Most of this is from domestic sources, but the White House tally for foreign investment looks close to  $6 trillion , led by the UAE, Qatar, Japan plus others as well as foreign firms. Data appeared this week showing the President’s off the mark, by trillions of dollars. The data are from a bureau of that same Department of Commerce.  If you look carefully , you can find a file updated for 2025 that shows the historical position of foreign direct investment in the United States (“stock”) rose $266 billion last year. This is a bit more than the isolated 2025 “flow” results, and so is fair to the President. It’s basically the same as the $260-billion improvement in stock seen in 2024 under Biden. This pace won’t reach $6 trillion for decades, and current shortfalls are stark. Investment from the UAE, which the White House says will someday touch $1.4 trillion, barely budged in 2025. Qatar, said to be investing $1.2 trillion, isn’t even recorded on its own. “Other” investment from the Middle East fell last year. Saudi Arabia’s investment rose by $1.4 billion. It has supposedly pledged more than 400 times that. (Note the Iran war hadn’t yet started.) $, billions Foreign Investor What the White House Says What 2025 Showed       UAE 1400 3.5 Qatar 1200 Not even recorded Japan 1000 26.7 Saudi Arabia 600 1.4 EU 600 143 India 500 1.1 South Korea 450 4.8       Total 5750 181 Perhaps these countries lied to the President; it’s not like Qatar has been a friend of ours. But what about Japan, possibly the most stalwart American ally? $1 trillion promised, says the White House, and not quite $27 billion realized last year. The administration has India due for $500 billion. India added $1 billion to its historical US investment position in 2025. South Korea’s on the hook for $450 billion, last year saw $4.8 billion. You’ll never guess who basically hit their targets— the no-good Europeans  President Trump is always insulting. Of $600 billion supposedly coming from the EU, $143 billion showed up in 2025. Germany’s nearly $50 billion looks very good compared to all the countries who the White House says are mad to invest here. Did things get better in the first quarter of this year? No. The historical position data aren’t available yet but  simple flows hit $92 billion  (or see line 56 in Commerce  Table 6.1 ) If you use these flows to check on White House claims, at this pace it would take until 2041 to achieve $6 trillion (and flows were slower last year). No individual country reached $20 billion in the first quarter. The UAE and Qatar, especially, better hit the gas soon. I’ve written before that the  President might be referring to portfolio investment , in US stocks and bonds. Because that rose more than  $4.8 trillion  in 2025, though it did drop in the first quarter. Here, Japan and South Korea join the EU in being well on their way to the White House’s numbers. The UAE’s investment again rose just a bit. Saudi and Indian investment still fell and Qatar again isn’t counted. The bigger problem, of course, is rising stock and bond markets don’t help everyone. For those helped, it may not be enough to offset housing, health, and food costs. President Trump can be right that we have the hottest securities markets. He often  treats the stock market as if it’s America . But stocks aren’t the economy, much less the country. For investment that  directly  creates jobs and  directly  benefits ordinary Americans, the Trump administration is falling trillions short. The post Numbers That Crunch President Trump appeared first on American Enterprise Institute - AEI .