Ecuador Company & Shareholder Directory

Analysis

What this data actually tells you about Ecuador

Ecuador is a dollarized, upper-middle-income economy of roughly $124.7 billion in nominal GDP as of 2024, with GDP per capita around $6,000. The economy contracted an estimated 2% in 2024 — hit by severe drought-driven electricity blackouts, falling oil output and insecurity — before rebounding an estimated 3.7% in 2025 on the back of exports, investment and private consumption. Growth is expected to stabilize around 2.5% for 2026-2028, conditional on reduced political uncertainty. Ecuador’s most distinctive economic feature is full dollarization: it has used the US dollar as its sole official currency since 2000, abandoning the sucre after a severe banking and currency crisis. This has kept inflation structurally low — just 1.18% in June 2024 — but also removes independent monetary policy as a tool, a point of recurring political debate. The fiscal deficit stood at roughly 2.9%-3.2% of GDP in 2025, with public accounts expected to approach balance in 2026 aided by oil prices. The economy remains structurally dependent on primary-sector exports — crude oil, bananas, shrimp and cacao — and on remittances from Ecuadorians abroad, which represented roughly 3.9%-5% of GDP in 2024. Counterparties verify a specific counterparty’s actual current exposure to dollarization-linked monetary constraints and export-tariff risk directly.

The United States is Ecuador’s top trading partner: in 2024, US goods exports to Ecuador totaled $7.7 billion (28% of Ecuador’s total imports), even though no formal US-Ecuador free trade agreement exists. China is Ecuador’s second-largest partner; Ecuador’s exports to China reached $4.64 billion in 2024. Ecuador’s first trade agreement with an Asian country — a bilateral FTA with China signed May 2023 — entered into force on May 1, 2024, granting preferential access to 99.6% of Ecuadorian exports to China. Export performance strengthened further in 2025: exports rose 11% year-on-year in the first half of 2025, with shrimp overtaking crude oil as Ecuador’s top export and the trade surplus hitting a record $4.17 billion for a first half. However, a 10% US baseline tariff has applied to most Ecuadorian exports — including bananas, cacao and shrimp — since April 2025, a headwind for exporters. FDI remains structurally weak: it fell more than 83% from its 2018 peak of $1.39 billion by 2024, with just $120 million recorded in H1 2024. A modest recovery began in Q1 2025 ($127.5 million, +17% YoY), led by agriculture (38% of inflows) and mining (36%). Ecuador is a member of the Andean Community (CAN) and holds observer status in the Pacific Alliance. Counterparties verify a specific counterparty’s current tariff exposure and FDI-linked investment status directly.

Ecuador’s population is approximately 18.3-18.5 million, with a median age of about 30 years and roughly two-thirds urban. Labor informality is high and persistent: INEC recorded informal employment at 56% in January 2025 — the highest for that month since 2021 — easing to roughly 51.5%-52.4% through the rest of 2025; national unemployment stood at 3.8% in January 2025, with “adequate employment” around 34%-35%. The dominant current-events story is Ecuador’s security crisis. Homicides rose 574% from 2019 to 2023 (from ~7 to ~47 per 100,000), the steepest increase in Latin America. On January 9, 2024, following an armed takeover of a television station, President Daniel Noboa decreed an “internal armed conflict” against 22 designated criminal groups. The 2024 homicide rate fell modestly but remained the region’s highest; by the end of 2025 the rate had risen again to a new peak of about 51 per 100,000. Human Rights Watch and the IACHR have documented allegations of extrajudicial killings and due-process violations tied to the security crackdown. Prison violence has been severe and recurring: a November 2024 riot at Guayaquil’s Litoral Penitentiary killed at least 17, and a November 2025 riot at Machala killed 31; the IACHR counted at least 663 inmate deaths in Ecuadorian prisons since 2020. Politically, Noboa won re-election on April 13, 2025 (56% runoff vote); a November 2025 referendum was rejected by voters after a 31-day Indigenous-led national strike over fuel-subsidy cuts, and Ecuador remains under an IMF Extended Fund Facility program the IMF describes as performing strongly. Counterparties verify a specific counterparty’s actual current security exposure and operational continuity directly rather than assume conditions have stabilized.