Within Latin America, it is ranked as the second-most competitive country, only behind Chile. However, it remains weak in areas such as institutionality, education and transparency. According to the report, some factors that are negative for doing business in the country are its corruption and governmental bureaucracy.

Nicólas Ardito Barletta, director of the National Center for the Competitiveness of Panama, said that this improvement should be taken as a stimulus to continue growing and working to make the country ever more competitive.

For three years, Panama has stayed in the top 50 on such issues as transportation infrastructure, ports, macroeconomic stability, financial market development and foreign direct investment flows. The government has implemented some 30 measures to improve competitiveness in the country.