The European Commission (EC) avoided this Thursday ruling on the acquisition of 9.9% of the shares of Telefónica by the saudi group STCwho thus becomes the company’s largest shareholder, but recalled that there is a mechanism in the European Union to control foreign direct investment.
“Let me first of all stress that the European Commission is not in a position to comment on individual transactions of this nature. This is for confidentiality reasons”, declared the EC spokesperson Miriam García Ferrer during the daily press conference of the Community Executive.
In general terms, without referring to the specific case of Telefónica, he recalled that the European Union has had a foreign investment control mechanism since 2020 whose objective is “identify and address potential risks to security or public order in the EU”.
“When there is a transaction and a foreign investment of a particular company within the European Union that could cause this risk to security or public order, the country in question can implement a foreign direct investment control mechanism and can also consult the the European Commission on this particular case“said the spokeswoman.
He insisted that he was not referring to the specific case of telephone.
“We then decide on a case-by-case basis based on risk whether mitigation measures need to be implemented or whether the investment should be prohibited. But, again, this is something that happens in very specific cases under this regulation and I am not referring specifically to this transaction.”, he commented.
Source: EFE
Source: Gestion
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