Que faire des fonds d’investissement publics en Europe ?

Si l’Europe des 27 ne parvient pas à trouver un accord sur la gestion des rachats étrangers, les Etats membres prendront des mesures au niveau national, risquant de créer des obstacles à la libre circulation des capitaux, à l’extérieur comme à l’intérieur de l’UE, explique Philip Whyte dans un article publié cet automne pour le Centre for European Reform. 

The author raises the question of EU intervention on the issue of foreign takeovers, at a time when Germany is thinking of preventing sovereign funds from buying local companies in sensitive sectors and the Commission is currently considering how it should respond to such defensive acts. 

Whether it decides to outlaw such action, or establish it at EU level, the EU should ensure that the measures do not threaten the openness of the single market, outlines the author. 

He observes the changes that the Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) has been undergoing. The new actors, such as Russia and China, are growing rapidly and their emergence matters because they originate from potential geopolitical rivals. These countries are less likely to play by the West’s rules than the traditional major SWF actors – Norway, Singapore, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. 

The shift from private to public actors also raises a number of concerns. It is generally believed that privatised European companies could be bought by foreign governments, notes Whyte. However, even though SWFs would try to buy majority stakes in companies – which is not yet the case – it is not clear that host countries should necessarily prevent them from doing so, he adds. 

State-owned companies, for example, have been allowed to make cross-border takeover in the EU, says the author. 

However, another question arises when SWFs or other state-owned entities seek to buy companies in strategic sectors such as security or energy. The problem is that they may be tempted to buy firms in certain sectors for reasons other than boosting investment returns, the author says. The example of Russia, which used Gazprom as a foreign policy tool, confounded these concerns, he adds. 

According to the author, the German proposal to introduce a vetting procedure for foreign takeovers is not the right answer, as it would take too much time to get the 27 member states to agree on what its mandate should be. Moreover, it could become the target of protectionist lobbying by governments with an excessively broad understanding of what constitutes snational securitys. 

The EU should discuss alternative solutions that ease fears about foreign political control without succumbing to the temptation of protectionism, concludes the author.