(Photo: VCG)

TBILISI, Aug. 15 (Xinhua) -- Foreign direct investment (FDI) in Georgia dropped 35.5 percent year-on-year to 1.26 billion U.S. dollars in 2018, the lowest level since 2014, the country's statistics office said Thursday.

According to the newly-adjusted report released by the National Statistics Office of Georgia, Azerbaijan, Britain, the Netherlands, the United States and China were among the major investors for Georgia in 2018.

Azerbaijan ranked top, with 246 million dollars of investment in Georgia last year.

Among them, China was one of the fast growing investors, with an increase of 290 percent over 2017, for Georgia.

The report also revealed that finance, construction and transports and communications were the major economic sectors that attracted most international investment. The above-mentioned sectors received 48 percent of the total investment in 2018.

Analysts attributed the sharp decrease of FDI in 2018 to the completion of a major pipeline project, transferring of ownership in some big companies and reduction in liabilities to non-resident direct investors in the country.