Lucas Guttenberg

Great rundown by @martinsandbu.ft.com on the complex roots of Germany’s economic malaise - plus a very welcome shout-out to our proposal with @sandertordoir.bsky.social and @lucasguttenberg.bsky.social for coordinated Buy European EV clauses as part of the fix.

on.ft.com/4plaPvt

Europäische Autoindustrie: Wie der Autoindustrie wirklich geholfen werden kann Kippt das EU-Verbrenneraus, verliert Europa endgültig den Anschluss auf dem E-Automarkt. Die Politik sollte lieber die Förderung verbessern. Zwei Vorschläge

Für die Zeit haben wir mit @lucasguttenberg.bsky.social und @sandertordoir.bsky.social aufgeschrieben, was das Problem der europäischen Autoindustrie ist, warum Denkmalschutz für Verbrenner die schlechtesten aller Antworten wäre - und was die EU stattdessen tun kann.
www.zeit.de/mobilitaet/2...

Great thread by Nils on our new paper.

Joint work - Germany, France and the other member-states can either do a coordinated demand push for EU built cars or descent into a chaos of regulatory roll-backs and bailouts.

It really is hang together or separately for European cars.

The car crisis tops today’s EU summit but leaders keep staring at the wrong problem

The issue isn’t the 2035 engine ban - it’s demand falling off a cliff today

With @sandertordoir.bsky.social and @lucasguttenberg.bsky.social, we show why flipping regs won’t help - and what the EU can do instead.

I hope the Commission made it clear that the €600 billion figure of course refers to current prices - and that most of it will be mobilised through EIB loans, with a leverage ratio of approximately 1:19.

I think they promised him a new bank.

Ripe for Reform – What’s in the EU Budget Proposal and What Should Come Next On 16 July 2025, the European Commission unveiled its proposal for the next Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) for 2028-35, kicking off what promises to be a highly fraught and marathon set of nego...

Just a few weeks to go before the EU dives into what will likely be a bruising battle over its next budget.

@romyha.bsky.social, @eulaliarubio.bsky.social, @lindnerjs.bsky.social l and I took a closer look at the Commission’s proposal.

We think successful negotiations now hinge on four things:

"A divided EU can still accept a bad deal that is better than no deal. But only a united EU with a clearly mandated Commission can engage in a sustained trade war and weather the short-term domestic costs."

This is good.

You can't expect the Jeunesse d'Esch to play like Real Madrid.

No Accident: Four Structural Reasons Why the EU Did Not Get a Better Trade Deal As details on Sunday’s EU-US trade deal emerge, Europeans are split in two camps. Some believe the 15 percent tariff ceiling on most products is the best the EU could get from President Donald Trump’s...

15% tariffs, breaches of WTO rules, more tech dependency – the US deal is a far cry from what the EU wanted. This was not a one-off accident, but exposes longstanding structural weaknesses in EU trade policy that will affect any future negotiation. My analysis🧵 bst-europe.eu/economy-secu...

No Accident: Four Structural Reasons Why the EU Did Not Get a Better Trade Deal As details on Sunday’s EU-US trade deal emerge, Europeans are split in two camps. Some believe the 15 percent tariff ceiling on most products is the best the EU could get from President Donald Trump’s...

Many seem surprised about the EU-US trade deal. But this was not an accident and it would likely happen the same way if we did it all over again. Read my colleague Etienne Höra (@etiennehoera.d-64.social)'s latest on the structural drivers of EU trade policy that have led to a bad deal:

Well, « shadow of plausible deniability » is a much nicer way of saying the above. bsky.app/profile/luca...

Excellent and honestly shameful example of the shadow of plausible deniability: Member states (and of course France among them) gave the Commission clear directions and are now running away from the results, blaming the Commission instead. At least own it collectively, it makes us look less stupid.

Germany and France hit out at EU-US deal Euro slides as investors bet that long-awaited trade agreement will hurt Eurozone economy

Well, it is mainly France hitting out - Merz supports the deal but points out it hurts EU exporters.

Be that as it may, this is very disingenous: the contours of the deal we were headed for was clear for weeks. The two most powerful EU member-states could've stopped it.

www.ft.com/content/00ec...

I don't want to blow anyone's mind with insight behind the curtain of international relations here, but in multi-billion dollar deals between gigantic economies, it's pretty useful to have agreed clarity on what the fuck's actually been agreed.

What's the realo version without optimism?

My informed sense, also reflecting the reporting on the negotiations. But of course these negotiations are confidential, so we don't know for sure.

I don't think that is correct. My sense is that member states were very much involved, albeit behind closed doors (which makes sense, given that this was a negotiation situation).

Might or might not be true, but my point is that the chicken resides in Berlin, Paris or Rome rather than in Brussels.

Excellent and honestly shameful example of the shadow of plausible deniability: Member states (and of course France among them) gave the Commission clear directions and are now running away from the results, blaming the Commission instead. At least own it collectively, it makes us look less stupid.

I am all for the COM to take independent stances. But the reality is that in a matter that is perceived as core economic interest by big member states, the COM is not free to do what it likes. It needs said member states ten times a day in other dossiers. In that sense it is very much not the ECB.

That was my point: I think saying the Commission had the choice of doing nothing ignores the political reality that it did not have the necessary backing for that option to be viable. The fact that it is formally in charge does not mean it can do what it wants. It's not the ECB.

EU trade policy has the Commission operating largely on its own with member states giving guidance but staying in the shadow of plausible deniability. That might be the right setup for day-to-day trade technocracy. It's definitely not the setup for a full-scale hyperpolitical trade war with the US.

I don't think that is how it would have played out. The COM would have gotten under massive fire the moment the new tariffs would have hit from interest groups and from the big exporting member states, and especially the big ones. That is not something the Commission can handle for very long.

Important takeaway for the next round of this: by itself, COM isn’t equipped to manage the domestic politics of this, it needs stronger backing from capitals. Convenient for member states to hide behind it and then blame it for the outcome (sometimes more than they blame the US I feel).

I agree, but COM was also caught between a rock and a hard place: I am not sure member state governments, and in particular the one in Berlin, would have had the polical stamina for a full-scale trade war. And of course they would have blamed the COM for all the collateral damage it would have had.

Stimmt. Ich glaube, manche sehen die Risiken durchaus – sind aber defaitistisch.

Warum glauben so viele in Berlin, Deutschland könne Chinas Industriepolitik nichts entgegensetzen?

Dabei haben wir riesige fiskalische Spielräume und eine starke industrielle Basis.

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Der Kollege Tordoir macht sich gerade sehr verdient damit, immer wieder auf die Gefahren des zweiten China-Schocks für Deutschland hinzuweisen. Mein Gefühl ist allerdings, dass er damit nicht ausreichend gehört wird...

Dos and Don’ts for the EU-China Summit EU-China relations are experiencing a period of rising tensions. There is no reason for optimism that this will change any time soon. European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen emphasised in ...

Ahead of tomorrow’s EU-China summit, the EU faces a tough balancing act between economic interests and geopolitical concerns.

What should Brussels do and what should it avoid?

This new piece by @corajungbluth.bsky.social lays out the dos and don’ts:
bst-europe.eu/economy-secu...

Muss Deutschland jetzt viel mehr in den EU-Haushalt zahlen und ist Deutschland gar der Angeschmierte beim Vorschlag der EU-Kommission zum neuen Mehrjährigen Finanzrahmen? Die Antwort darauf ist kompliziert - aber schlecht kommt Deutschland sicher nicht weg.

Warum? Stay with me: