The European Union’s response to US tariffs may embrace regulating using information by American large tech teams, France’s finance minister stated in an interview with the JDD newspaper.
“We’ve got a number of instruments at our disposal on the European stage: regulatory, fiscal, customs,” Eric Lombard stated within the interview revealed late Saturday. “For instance, we will strengthen sure environmental necessities or regulate using information by sure digital gamers,” he added.
President Donald Trump introduced on April 2 broad tariffs on imports into the US, together with 20% duties on EU items, as a part of his efforts to shake up the worldwide buying and selling system. The bloc — the US’s largest buying and selling companion — has vowed to retaliate with countermeasures if wanted, together with with its personal tariffs, taxing companies and focusing on American tech companies.
Lombard stated EU guidelines additionally enable for taxes on sure American actions, with all of the choices remaining open and beneath dialogue. He didn’t element how information utilization by large tech teams could possibly be strengthened. Information assortment and processing is already regulated by EU guidelines just like the far-reaching GDPR.
Learn Extra: France Eyes US Massive Tech in EU Retaliation to Trump’s Tariffs
The European response to US tariffs ought to “inevitably” have “penalties” for each the continent’s and US firms, Lombard stated. “It’s not a query of taxing all American imports, that might be counterproductive, penalizing our financial system as a lot as theirs,” he informed the newspaper. “So we’re going to goal sure industrial segments, in a exact method.”
Lombard pressured that he nonetheless sees a risk for tariffs to be lifted by means of negotiations. “If we attain a balanced settlement inside an inexpensive time-frame, it is going to be a confidence issue” for French firms and households, he stated.
This story was initially featured on Fortune.com
