News and analysis on trade policy in Europe
Tuesday, April 29, 2025
The EU is preparing to extend its side of the bargain in a tariff truce agreed with Washington in October 2021 to leave room for negotiating a long-term settlement over steel and aluminium duties initially enacted by the Trump administration on national security grounds in 2018.
Here is a roundup of what trade think tanks have been up to this week.
The ratification by the European Parliament of a trade agreement with New Zealand this week is the swan song of a long EU policy cycle made of globalising optimism and constructive economic diplomacy. Next year’s European Parliament elections might mark the turn to darker times.
The European Commission initiated four new trade defence investigations only this week, two of them targeting Chinese products. This brings the total number of new anti-dumping cases initiated this year to seven, two more than Brussels launched in 2022.
The latest iteration of the annual report of the China Chamber of Commerce to the European Union has rarely been so critical of what it sees as the EU’s inward looking drive and its growing focus on security in its relationships with China. It takes aim specifically at a policy …
The European Commission released ‘digital trade agreement’ text it intends to negotiate with Singapore and with South Korea. It ignores some of these countries’ key priorities for digital trade.
Due to the All Saints holiday, activity has been fairly subdued on the trade beat in Brussels. Such holiday weeks are generally a good opportunity for leaders to travel. European Commission executive vice-president Valdis Dombrovskis has been touring Asia, whereas the international trade committee of the European Parliament was in …
The European Commission has decided not to sample Tesla Shanghai, the largest exporter of electric vehicles from China to the EU, as part of its ongoing investigation into Beijing’s subsidies into the sector.
The European Parliament’s international trade committee wants the European Commission to up its game in its trade cooperation efforts with Taiwan.
The European Commission reports that there is noticeable progress among EU member states in adopting or strengthening their inward FDI screening mechanisms since Russia attacked Ukraine in March 2022. The commission is expected to obtain greater support for its plan to strengthen the existing EU-wide investment screening mechanism from at …
