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For more insights and analysis from Cleary lawyers on policy and regulatory developments from a legal perspective, visit What to Expect From a Second Trump Administration.

On February 21, 2025, President Trump issued a memorandum to various U.S. government agencies setting forth an “America First Investment Policy” (the “Memorandum”).  While the Memorandum is a call to arms for the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (“CFIUS”) to further restrict Chinese investments into the United States and for the U.S. government to use the recently implemented U.S. Outbound Investment Security Program (“OISP”) to restrict additional U.S. outbound investment into China (described in our alert memorandum linked here), the Memorandum also aims to facilitate inbound investment from allies and partners. Continue Reading President Trump Issues “America First Investment Policy”: Confirms U.S. Openness to Foreign Investment from Allies and Partners, Calls for Enhanced Restrictions on Investments from and into China

In 2024, the FSR’s first year in operation saw a large number of filings but limited enforcement, with only a handful of Phase 2 reviews, one conditional merger clearance and two ex officio cases. With the FSR now up and running, in 2025, we expect the EC’s focus to be on demonstrating the FSR’s value and delivering practical results by stepping up enforcement, building a corpus of reasoned decisions, and – it is hoped – developing a more streamlined process for non-issue cases.Continue Reading The EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation: 2024 in Review and Predictions for 2025

Global FDI enforcement continued to evolve rapidly in Q4 2024, as shown by the range of developments summarized in this newsletter.Continue Reading Global FDI Newsletter: October – December 2024

On October 17, 2024, the European Commission (“Commission“) published its forth annual report on the screening of foreign direct investments (“FDI“) into the Union (the “Report“), following previous editions published in October 2023, September 2022 and November 2021. Notable findings include the follow:Continue Reading EU FDI: State Of The Union (2024)

On October 28, 2024, the U.S. Department of the Treasury (“Treasury”) issued a long-awaited Final Rule (the “Final Rule”) implementing the U.S. Outbound Investment Security Program (the “Program”).[1] Under the Program, effective January 2, 2025, U.S. persons will be prohibited from engaging in, or required to notify Treasury regarding, a broad range of transactions involving entities engaged in certain activities relating to semiconductors and microelectronics, quantum information technologies, and artificial intelligence (“AI”) systems in “countries of concern” (presently limited to China, Hong Kong, and Macau).

Please click here to read the full alert memorandum.Continue Reading Long-Awaited U.S. Outbound Investment Regime Published, Will Become Effective January 2, 2025

  • United States: CFIUS releases 2023 Annual Report; expanded scope for CFIUS jurisdiction and filing requirements; new export controls on quantum computing and other advanced technologies.
  • United Kingdom: Annual Report published; remedies imposed on four transactions.
  • European Union: First merger commitments adopted under EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation.
  • Belgium: First Annual Report on Belgian FDI Screening; revised notification forms and guidelines.
  • France: Close scrutiny for foreign investment in pharmaceutical sector (Biogaran and Doliprane).
  • Germany: Prohibition of Chinese investment in gas turbine sector.
  • Italy: Annual Report shows that volume of filings remain high but majority deemed out-of-scope and intervention rates low (22 out of 563 filings).
  • Netherlands: Proposal for new sectoral investment control regime for defense industry.
  • Spain: Government prohibits €619 million acquisition of Spanish train manufacturer Talgo by Hungarian consortium

Continue Reading Global FDI Update: July – September 2024

  • Belgium issues first statistics on its FDI regime: vast majority cleared in phase I, a handful in phase II, and one ex officio investigation.
  • EU Commission starts showing its teeth in the enforcement of the Foreign Subsidies Regulation, with the first ex officio investigations.
  • France publishes its 2023 FDI report, with filing numbers and outcomes that are largely consistent with previous years.
  • Germany’s plans to overhaul its FDI regime slow down amid political controversies.
  • Italy authorizes Safran’s acquisition of RTX’s actuator business, reversing its initial veto, in light of Safran’s commitments.
  • Rotterdam court issues first judgment under the new Dutch FDI regime, ruling against the Government.
  • Four years of Spanish FDI screening: an overview.
  • UK Government issues updated guidelines on National Security & Investment Act (NSIA).
  • President Biden issues order requiring Chinese owner to divest cryptocurrency mining facility near U.S. military base.

Continue Reading Cleary Gottlieb FDI Newsletter: April – June 2024

  • The European Commission proposes a revised EU FDI Screening Regulation
  • EU takes time to ready Outbound Investment Control Toolkit
  • German FDI reviews dropped in 2023, but FDI review activity follows the trends of prior years
  • Italian FDI reviews in 2023 remained consistently high, despite the end of the extraordinary provisions enacted in connection with the Covid-19 outbreak
  • UK: NSIA decisions, Telegraph Media Group public interest review, and new legislation prohibiting foreign state ownership of newspapers
  • In the U.S., updates to the Critical and Emerging Technologies list signal refinement of focus for CFIUS.

Continue Reading Cleary Gottlieb FDI Newsletter: January – March 2024

The German FDI authority, the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (“BMWK”), has published the German FDI screening statistics for 2023.[1]Continue Reading Overall number of German FDI screenings slightly dropped in 2023, but review follows the trends of prior years