Trade protectionism is a very dangerous medicine for economic illnesses. On most occasions it is like a drug that kills the pain and the symptoms but at the same time it dilutes the possibility to cure the illness that causes them. If an economy loses its competitiveness in a certain sector or in the entire […]Trade protectionism and cartels threaten democracy
September 3, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Trade protectionism is a very dangerous medicine for economic illnesses. On most occasions it is like a drug that kills the pain and the symptoms but at the same time it dilutes the possibility to cure the illness that causes them. If an economy loses its competitiveness in a certain sector or in the entire […]EU and China resolve amicably solar panel trade dispute
July 29, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Exactly ten days after the European Sting predicted on 19 July that most likely EU and China would soon settle their long time dispute on solar panels, Commissioner De Gucht confirmed last Saturday: “We found an amicable solution in the EU-China solar panels case that will lead to a new market equilibrium at sustainable prices”. In […]Commission caps charges on card and Internet payments and enforces competition
July 26, 2013 by Leave a Comment
It was high time that the European Commission tried to arrest the over-exploitation of European consumers by a handful of banks and credit card providers. This week Joaquín Almunia, Commission’s Vice President responsible for competition policy, and Michel Barnier, EU Commissioner in charge of internal market and services presented one draft regulation and one directive amendment, […]China hopes EU Commissioner De Gucht drops super anti-dumping tariff on solar panels
July 19, 2013 by 2 Comments
With EU – China bilateral trade volume at more than €1 billion a day and both ways investment flows at around €20bn a year, accusations and complaints over state subsidies, dumping and other trade distorting practices exchanged between the two giant partners seem unimportant. Yet the recent proliferation of the anti-dumping and anti-state-subsidies measures adopted […]Two EU Commissioners fire at will against the US
July 18, 2013 by Leave a Comment
From both sides of the Atlantic Ocean two European Commissioners, Michel Barnier from Washington and Vivian Reding from Heidelberg, while addressing yesterday quite different audiences, sent out converging messages criticising the US. They both expressed novel views vis-à-vis EU–US relations in general, which can be interpreted as hardening of Commission’s position in reference to on-going […]EU-US trade talks go ahead despite Prism and civil rights breach
July 5, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Apart from the largely hypocritical cries by European politicians mainly in Brussels about civil rights breaches, the only concrete and immediate implications that the American PRISM scandal could have had on EU-US relations refers to the Free Trade and Investments Agreement that the two sides are about to negotiate. For one thing European citizens are […]Counting spillovers from the fast track EU-US free trade agreement
June 16, 2013 by Leave a Comment
In a day when the US economy got good marks from the IMF for growth and the appropriate monetary easing by the Fed, last Friday 14 June the Foreign Affairs (trade) Council of the European Union also gave the green light to the European Commission to enter into formal bilateral trade negotiations with the United […]China confirms anti-state-subsidy investigation on EU wine imports
June 7, 2013 by Leave a Comment
Yesterday, only a few days after the European Commission decided to impose provisional anti-dumping tariffs on Chinese solar panels imported in the EU, the Mission of the People’s Republic of China to the European Union issued a Press release where the spokesperson of the Mission confirmed that the Ministry of Commerce of China, in response […]The EU threatens to impose extra import duties on Chinese products
April 12, 2013 by Leave a Comment
The powerful EU’s executive arm, the European Commission, announced yesterday its proposal for a new legislation targeted at strengthening the protection of home businesses and products from external competition. It’s a clear effort to help the Union’s economy overcome a deepening recession. The new legislations will be in force early in 2014, after being approved […]EU threatens Japan to suspend FTA negotiations if…
March 26, 2013 by Leave a Comment
The two Presidents of the EU, José Manuel Barroso of the Commission and Herman Van Rompuy of the Council couldn’t fly yesterday to Tokyo for the EU-Japan Summit, due to the ongoing developments around the Cyprus issue. This was not enough however to impede the beginning of negotiations for the conclusion of a Free Trade […]EU–US: What is the real exchange in a Free Trade Agreement?
February 14, 2013 by 1 Comment
The usually slow-moving European Commission over issues like free trade agreements, this time didn’t lose its time and President Manuel Barroso announced yesterday that, “the European Union and the United States have decided to initiate internal procedures to launch negotiations with the aim of reaching a ground-breaking free trade agreement: the Transatlantic Trade and Investment […]Does the EU want GMOs and meat with hormones from the US?
February 11, 2013 by 2 Comments
The prospective drafting of a bilateral Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the European Union and the United States is developing into a major issue and as things evolved last week, it seems that this may lead the EU into a new division, between France on the one side and the free trade lovers Britain and […]Huawei answers allegations about its selling prices
December 20, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Two major Chinese providers of mobile phone equipment, Huawei Technologies Co. and the smaller ZTE Corporation, according to a Wall Street Journal report are under scrutiny by the European Commission, for allegedly offering their products at dumping prices. This report is still unconfirmed by the EU authorities. Its wording though is very carefully chosen by […]EU to negotiate an FTA with Japan
November 30, 2012 by Leave a Comment
On 29 November 2012 the European Council decided to give the Commission ‘the green light’, to start trade negotiations with Japan, aiming at the conclusion of a Free Trade Agreement between the two sides. As Sting has already noticed the EU has embarked over the past few years on a huge operation, to conclude FTAs with […]EU: Huge surplus in the trade of services with the rest of the world
November 26, 2012 by Leave a Comment
A regular criticism neo-liberal economist pen down against the European Union is that Europe is not competitive enough. They blame for that the high EU standards of social protection and the strict labour legislation. They fail to see however that the Eurozone and even the entire European Union, is highly competitive in the crucial sector of […]
