Citing President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr.'s diligence particularly in courting international businesses to expand their domestic operations, foreign chambers gave him a thumbs up but said he still needs to push reforms to attract more foreign direct investments.

"Looking in from the outside, we are extremely encouraged that he has engaged with all our respective countries and continents. His visit to the US was successful, and he will visit Brussels next week. We see that invitations keep being extended but it is his initiative more than anything else that he is sending. He is engaging," according to Lars Wittig, president of the European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines.

Wittig said Marcos Jr.'s visit to Brussels, Belgium will center on the pursuit of a free-trade agreement with the European Union, "which as a chamber, we would like to see materialize as soon as possible."

Although the Philippines posted a 7.6 percent gross growth in the 3rd quarter of 2022, the 2nd highest in ASEAN for the period, and outperformed most projections, the country's inflation rate for November this year is seen by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas to hit from 7.4 percent to 8.2 percent due to high prices of electricity, liquified petroleum gas, and some agricultural items.

For American Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines executive director Ebb Hinchliffe, the President has done a superb job thus far.

"We are even surprised how he (Marcos Jr.) made the relationship between the Philippines and the US 180 degrees different from the previous administration. Absolutely, we are glad for his good directions," he said.

Tweaking FDI projection

Meanwhile, the JFC, a coalition of the American, Australian-New Zealand, Canadian, European, Japanese and Korean chambers and the Philippine Association of Multinational Companies Regional Headquarters Incorporated, tweaked their projections of the inflows of foreign direct investments until 2030.

The JFC said they peg the FDIs to hit $128 billion by 2030, from $78 billion in 2021, and $50 billion in 2020, which will create 3 million jobs for the Filipino workforce.