On Tuesday, November 20, the European Commission announced a political agreement with EU member states on a new framework for foreign direct investment (FDI) screening. The legal text for the framework still needs to be finalized and released. The announcement can be found here. According to the Commission, the new framework will provide a mechanism for the Commission and EU member states to request information and raise concerns related to FDI screening, without restricting…

On October 10, Treasury announced interim regulations to implement certain provisions of the Foreign Investment Review Modernization Act (FIRRMA), which President Trump signed into law on August 13, 2018. As part of that announcement, Treasury will initiate a pilot program imposing mandatory declarations on transactions involving certain sensitive sectors. That pilot program is due to go into effect on November 10, 2018 and will cover 27 “pilot program industries.” One of the questions for analysis…

The 116th Congress begins on January 3, 2019. Based on projections from yesterday’s midterms, Democrats will control the House of Representatives by a narrow margin, while Republicans will expand their hold on the Senate. The changes to Congress are likely to shape trade policy through 2019, but much will depend on how House Democrats use their new majority, and whether trade is a priority issue or whether it will be overtaken by domestic issues. Companies…

After more than a year of negotiation, the United States, Mexico and Canada reached an agreement to update the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which governed trade among the three nations. The new agreement may not go into effect until 2020 because leaders from the three countries must sign it and then Congress and the legislatures of Canada and Mexico must approve it – a process that will take months. The three NAFTA…

During discussions on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York on 26 September, President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed to launch bilateral negotiations to reach what Abe termed a “Trade Agreement on Goods.”  The statement issued by the two leaders of the world’s first and third largest economies envisages negotiations proceeding in two phases, the first designed to achieve market-opening largely through concessions in the agriculture sector…

On August 31, after a week of talks, Canada and the United States failed to reach agreement on a new NAFTA that aligns with the bilateral U.S.-Mexico agreement reached on August 27. Among the key outstanding issues is the U.S. objective of opening up Canada’s dairy market and the Canadian objective of maintaining Chapter 19 of the original NAFTA’s dispute settlement for antidumping and countervailing duty cases. Canada will resume negotiations with the U.S. on September…