(FORTUNE Magazine) – Is your investing antenna picking up irresistible international signals? It should be. Share prices of a number of corporations in Europe and Asia rose dramatically in the first six months of the year (see table). Only one major U.S. company did any better: Foxboro, a takeover target, had a price increase of 123%. Austria placed four companies in the top ten. Fund managers -- including Mark Edwards, a vice president with Rowe Price-Fleming International, a London investment firm -- believe investors are betting on Austrian companies to get full benefit from the integration of the two Germanies without having to carry any of the costs, as West Germany will have to do. Austria's Oesterreichische Landerbank has banking contacts in the East. Automaker Steyr Daimler Puch (no corporate relation to Daimler-Benz) has undergone a dramatic turnaround. Austrian Airlines, which flies throughout Eastern Europe, is ready for more business and tourist travel. U.S. investors who want to buy into a foreign company (for other possibilities, see The Global 500 section) can do so through their American brokers. But they in turn often use foreign brokers to purchase the stock, which may result in higher brokerage fees. Americans may also invest by way of American Depositary Receipts (ADRs), which trade like securities on U.S. stock exchanges. Many Global 500 stalwarts, including BAT Industries, Hitachi, Royal Dutch/Shell Group, Siemens, and Sony, fly their flags here via ADRs.

One company not on the Global 500: Ibusz, the Hungarian travel agency. But it is one of some 60 offerings quoted on Budapest's new exchange -- and one of the most popular. The initial issue was 23 times oversubscribed. Home for the Budapest exchange is a single room in a steel and glass building set incongruously in the old part of the city.

BOX: HOW TEN TOP FOREIGN STOCKS DID

COMPANY INDUSTRY COUNTRY % CHANGE Faber Merlin Hotels Malaysia 110% Oesterreichische Banking Austria 110% Landerbank Steyr Daimler Puch Motor vehicles Austria 90% Nintendo Videogames Japan 89% Banco Ambrosiano Banking Italy 83% Veneto Verbund Utilities Austria 77% Austrian Airlines Airline Austria 75% Italcementi Cement Italy 69% Bond Corp. Int'l Real estate Hong Kong 68% Honshu Paper Paper Japan 65% Kyocera Electronics Japan 65% Italcable Telecommuni- Italy 63% cations

SOURCE: MORGAN STANLEY CAPITAL INTERNATIONAL U.S. investors can buy into any of these overseas companies.