Macron Flexes Protectionist Muscle to Shield Vulnerable Firms
- President woos foreign investors while defending sovereignty
- Some officials want him to do more to protect French assets
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Emmanuel Macron is beefing up France’s arsenal of strategic tools to protect vulnerable firms against foreign buyers with deep pockets, with a particular eye on the US and China.
The government will soon set in stone tighter rules on takeovers by non-European Union investors, the Finance Ministry told Bloomberg. The threshold for triggering a review will be lowered and the number of protected areas extended to include critical raw materials, as well as French units of foreign companies.