On Thursday, May 18, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin waded further publicly into efforts on Capitol Hill to amend the authorizing statute underlying the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. (CFIUS), a U.S. Government interagency committee that conducts national security reviews.  Munchin reportedly told a gathering of business executives at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce: “There are some parts of CFIUS we probably do need to amend,” adding that officials “should be looking at”…

Congressional efforts to reform the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), a U.S. Government interagency committee that conducts national security reviews, continue apace. This week saw the introduction of bipartisan legislation in the U.S. Senate that would (i) give federal agriculture and food officials permanent representation on CFIUS and (ii) amend the statute to allow the Committee to consider agriculture and food-related criteria when reviewing transactions that could result in control of a U.S.…

Lawmakers in both the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate are examining ways to restrict Chinese investment in the United States by reforming national security reviews conducted by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), a U.S. Government interagency committee. The prospects for statutory changes to CFIUS reviews appear greater now than at any time since the underlying statute was overhauled nearly a decade ago.…

On January 19, 2017, the U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (“BIS”) issued several amendments to the Export Administration Regulations (“EAR”) to implement the India-U.S. Joint Statement of June 7, 2016, recognizing the U.S. and India as Major Defense Partners, and making certain technical changes regarding Hong Kong’s Import and Export (Strategic Commodities) Regulations.  The net result is a relaxation of licensing policy for certain national security and regional stability controlled items, including…

On December 2, 2016, President Obama blocked a Chinese-owned German company, Grand Chip Investment GmbH (“Grand Chip”), from acquiring the U.S. business of German company Aixtron SE (Aixtron), a semiconductor equipment manufacturer with a U.S. subsidiary headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. According to a related Treasury Department press release, the national security risk posed by the proposed acquisition was, in part, “the military applications of the overall technical body of knowledge and experience of Aixtron…

The incoming Trump administration’s approach to foreign direct investment (FDI) in the United States and to national security reviews conducted by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) is difficult to predict. Mr. Trump has criticized certain foreign investments in the United States, but his trade-related critiques have focused largely on U.S. free trade agreements and the loss of U.S. manufacturing jobs to foreign countries. Nonetheless, according to CNN, a…

In 2014, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), a U.S. Government interagency committee that conducts national security reviews of foreign investments, reviewed nearly 50% more transactions than it did in 2013, according to CFIUS’s recently published annual report to Congress. The dramatic increase likely reflects a combination of factors, including an increase in cross-border M&A activity, transactions involving sensitive industries or acquirers, and parties continuing to make filings with CFIUS…