In September 2024, Mario Draghi handed Ursula von der Leyen one of the most eagerly awaited economic documents of the decade. Almost 400 pages. 170 recommendations. And a central message stated bluntly: either Europe carries out radical reforms, or it will sink into relative decline against the United States and China.
The report estimated that to stay in the race, Europe would need to inject an additional 800 billion euros a year into its economy by 2030, the equivalent of 4.7% of its GDP. An investment shock comparable, in proportion, to the post-war Marshall Plan.
A year and a half later, the outcome is disappointing for anyone who expected real transformation. No progress has been made on the plan's central pillars. The capital markets union remains a promise, savings keep flowing abroad and European start-ups struggle to scale. No governance reform making Europe more agile has been carried out.
Of all the targeted recommendations, only 11 to 14% have started to be implemented, according to the think tanks tracking the file.
For an investor looking at this from a wealth perspective, the conclusion calls for a very concrete reading: if Europe cannot mobilise its own capital to finance its growth, it is not because the capital does not exist. It is because it is going elsewhere. Understanding why also means understanding what the best-informed savers are doing.
A documented and ignored paradox
European households invest around 300 billion euros a year outside the Union, mainly in the United States. That amount is comparable to the additional capital that could be mobilised within the Union under conditions better aligned with market needs.
By overwhelmingly favouring passive management tracking global indices such as the MSCI World, European institutions and savers mechanically direct 75% of their flows to the Wall Street giants. Europe exports its capital only to import, a few years later, the technologies it failed to finance at home.
This has a direct consequence the Draghi report only partly addresses, because it was not its purpose: savers who understood this reality a few years ago did not stay passive. They looked for other markets. Other jurisdictions. Other asset classes. And they were often right to.
The brain drain, a prelude to capital flight
The report highlights a skills shortage linked to an ageing population and a recurring brain drain. When it was published, only three European institutes were in the global top 50, against 21 for the United States.
According to the report, between 2008 and 2021, 147 European unicorns were created, but 40 of them moved their headquarters abroad, mainly to the United States, to access more generous funding.
This movement of companies often precedes and announces that of capital. When a continent's most dynamic entrepreneurs leave to develop their projects elsewhere, they take their legal structures, dividends and personal savings with them. This is not a moral judgement. It is a well-documented economic mechanism, and it applies to Europe today with particular sharpness.
Persistently weak growth, persistently high taxation
The European Union's GDP is expected to grow by 1.1% in 2025 and 1.5% in 2026. This is the baseline scenario in the Commission's official projections.
Compare that with other markets over the same period. Georgia posted 8.4% growth on average over the first two months of 2026. India is running at around 6.5%. Vietnam projects 5 to 7% for the year. The United Arab Emirates are holding above 4%. Meanwhile France, the eurozone's second-largest economy, is growing at 1.1% with a public deficit of 5.1% of GDP and debt approaching 118% of GDP.
This growth gap matters to an investor. Over ten years, a property asset in a market with 7% annual GDP growth appreciates in a fundamentally different environment from a similar asset in a market growing at 1%. Rental demand, resale prices, tenants' ability to pay rising rents: all of this depends on the economic health of the market you invest in.
Wealth taxation as a permanent adjustment variable
The Draghi report identified tax fragmentation between member states as one of the main obstacles to mobilising private capital in Europe. At national level, several countries show an even more worrying trend: wealth taxation that gets heavier with every budget, as public deficits refuse to shrink.
The logic is easy to understand, even if it is unpleasant to state: when a State does not control its spending, it looks for new revenue wherever it can find it. Established, declared wealth, whether property or financial, is the easiest target. This is not a pessimistic forecast. It is what the last ten budgets show.
Mario Draghi's diagnosis is a warning for your wealth. Diversify now towards jurisdictions offering growth and protection, such as Georgia and Dubai.
.png)
Diversifying outside the EU, legally and methodically
The rational response to this context is neither a hasty exit nor denial. It is the gradual, declared diversification of wealth towards jurisdictions offering better conditions for growth, yield and taxation. It is exactly what large families and family offices have long been doing. And it is now accessible to a much wider range of investors who have understood that the rules of the game have changed.
Any international diversification must of course comply with the reporting obligations of your country of tax residence: declaration of foreign accounts, reporting of large transfers, application of double taxation treaties. Tax authorities now exchange information automatically with almost every country in the world. Transparency is the only viable long-term strategy.
Within this framework, several markets stand out as particularly relevant in 2026.
Georgia: the market that ticks every box
It is the market we follow most closely at FFI, for reasons that have to do with both fundamentals and timing.
On the macroeconomic side, Georgia posted 8.4% growth over the first two months of 2026, public debt of 34.5% of GDP, a current account deficit at a historic low of 2.6% of GDP, and sovereign Eurobonds oversubscribed 5.5 times on international markets. Moody's raised its growth forecast to 6% for the full year. The Asian Development Bank, the EBRD and the IMF are all active in the country, a strong institutional signal about the soundness of its macroeconomic framework.
On the tax side, the country offers one of the most favourable frameworks in the world for a property investor: a flat 5% tax on rental income, no capital gains tax after two years of ownership, no wealth tax, transfer duties of around 1% on purchase, and corporate tax at 15% with a 0% regime on reinvested profits.
On the property side, the figures we see on the projects we select in Batumi are 8 to 12% net rental yield and price growth of 15 to 20% a year, with entry tickets from 40,000 euros. And the recent announcement of Trump Tower Tbilisi, designed by Gensler and backed by a consortium of serious developers, confirmed that the most demanding international players have validated this market with concrete decisions.
Dubai: a pause that creates a window
Since the start of the year, the Dubai market has been going through a cautious phase following regional geopolitical tensions. Transaction volumes fell by 30% in March 2026. Developers have relaxed their terms to keep activity going.
But the fundamentals remain intact: zero personal income tax, no capital gains tax, sustained population growth, and a position as a global logistics and financial hub. Dubai came through 2008, the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. Each time, investors who held or strengthened their positions at the bottom of the cycle were rewarded.
For an investor with a five- to seven-year horizon, the current configuration can offer entry points that the euphoria of previous years made unreachable. This is the kind of analysis we carry out with our clients to find the right timing and structure.
The real risk for European savers today is not stock market volatility. It is the slow erosion of wealth invested in States that are increasingly indebted and decreasingly sovereign.
That sentence, written by wealth analysts in response to the Draghi report, sums up the situation better than any political speech. The risk is not spectacular. It does not show up as a stock market crash or a visible banking crisis. It builds up silently, budget after budget, tax reform after tax reform, in the gradual erosion of the net return on wealth concentrated in a single jurisdiction.
International diversification is not the answer to every problem. It is one tool among others in a well-built wealth strategy. But in 2026, given what official figures say about Europe's trajectory, its usefulness is no longer in question for anyone who takes the time to read the available data seriously.
The Draghi report made a diagnosis. European institutions have started to respond, too slowly for those who hoped for rapid change. Meanwhile, capital keeps moving to where conditions are better: to the United States for institutional flows, and to high-growth property markets for private investors who have understood that the geography of returns is no longer centred on Western Europe.
This movement is neither immoral nor irreversible. But it is real, and it concerns more and more investors who no longer see themselves in the options their domestic market offers. It is for them, and with them, that we work at FFI.
We help investors structure their international wealth: review of the existing situation, selection of markets and projects, legal and tax structuring, banking support. The first conversation commits you to nothing.
Global expertise to support your investment journey seamlessly across borders and jurisdictions.
