News

As part of the 2026 European Semester Spring Package, the European Commission published its economic assessment and country-specific recommendations for Italy, outlining the country’s main structural challenges in terms of competitiveness, sustainability and social cohesion. While employment growth remains positive and progress has been made in implementing the Recovery and Resilience Plan, Italy continues to face weak productivity growth, high public debt, significant regional disparities and persistent demographic challenges. The Commission calls on Italy to strengthen an innovation-driven industrial policy, support research and business growth, accelerate the energy transition and improve the business environment through administrative simplification, a more efficient justice system and stronger competition. Particular attention is also given to increasing women’s and young people’s participation in the labour market, improving skills, tackling undeclared work, ensuring the sustainability of the healthcare system and reducing territorial and social inequalities.

The European Commission has launched a targeted consultation on the documentation to be required from importers to demonstrate the country where steel was originally melted and poured (“melt and pour”), under the new EU Steel Regulation. The measure, a key element of the traceability regime, aims to strengthen transparency in steel trade and address the effects of global overcapacity on the European steel market. The consultation, open from 4 June to 2 July 2026, is addressed to producers, users, traders, importers, industry associations and other stakeholders, with the aim of identifying practical and reliable documentary evidence. The relevant Implementing Act is expected to be adopted by 31 August 2026 and to enter into force on 1 October 2026. The EU Steel Regulation will apply from 1 July 2026.

The European Commission has published the European Startup and Scaleup Scoreboard, a new monitoring tool designed to provide a comparative overview of the performance of European entrepreneurial ecosystems over the 2020-2025 period. Based on 36 indicators grouped across six dimensions, the framework analyses aspects related to startups, scaleups and access to finance, allowing comparisons between Member States and, for selected indicators, with global competitors. The tool also includes the Startup and Scaleup Index, which classifies European countries into four performance groups (“front-runner”, “high-performing”, “catching-up” and “rising”). In 2025, Italy is included in the “catching-up” category, showing an improvement compared to the previous year. The initiative forms part of the broader EU strategy aimed at strengthening competitiveness, innovation and the growth capacity of European businesses.

The European Commission has presented the European Technological Sovereignty Package, aimed at strengthening the EU’s capacity in strategic areas such as semiconductors, artificial intelligence, cloud and open source. The initiative includes two legislative proposals, the Chips Act 2.0 and the Cloud and AI Development Act, alongside an Open Source Strategy and a roadmap for digitalisation and AI in the energy sector. The package seeks to reduce structural dependencies on non-EU suppliers, while supporting the development, deployment and security of critical technologies for businesses, citizens and public administrations. Key measures include strengthening Europe’s semiconductor base, expanding data centre capacity, supporting European open-source solutions and ensuring the sustainable integration of digital infrastructure into the energy system. The legislative proposals will now be examined by the European Parliament and the Council.

The European Commission has presented a plan to modernise the Union’s legislative process, with the aim of making EU rules clearer, simpler and better enforced, while strengthening the competitiveness of the Single Market. The initiative is structured around five main areas: embedding the principle of “simplicity by design” into future legislative proposals; reinforcing the Better Regulation framework to improve transparency and stakeholder involvement; reviewing existing legislation to reduce overlaps and unnecessary complexity; tackling regulatory gold-plating at national level; and accelerating the enforcement of EU rules while reducing the number of long-standing infringement procedures. The Commission also calls on the European Parliament and the Council to ensure the consistent application of simplification and better regulation principles throughout the legislative process.

On 24 April 2026, the European Union and the United States signed a Memorandum of Understanding in Washington on a strategic partnership for critical minerals, accompanied by a Joint Action Plan to strengthen the resilience of supply chains. The initiative aims to support more secure, diversified and sustainable supply chains, considered essential for strategic sectors such as energy, automotive, electronics and defence. Priorities include supporting innovative industrial projects, including in third countries, using investment de-risking tools and strengthening links between European and US companies. The Action Plan also provides for the examination of coordinated trade instruments, including markets based on common standards, offtake agreements, pricing mechanisms and stockpiling, as well as rapid response measures in the event of supply disruptions. Although not legally binding, the agreement confirms the EU and US’s commitment to strengthening transatlantic economic security and reducing strategic dependencies in a sector that is increasingly central to industrial competitiveness and the energy transition.

The European Parliament has adopted its position on the EU multiannual financial framework for 2028-2034, ahead of future negotiations with the Council on the Union’s next long-term budget. MEPs call for the budget to be set at 1.27% of EU GNI, excluding the repayment of NextGenerationEU debt, which they argue should be managed separately in order to avoid affecting EU programmes and investments. Parliament’s position seeks to reinforce the Union’s new strategic priorities, notably defence, competitiveness, innovation and the green and digital transitions, while safeguarding traditional policies such as cohesion, agriculture and support for SMEs. MEPs also call for increased funding for key programmes including Horizon Europe, Erasmus+, the Connecting Europe Facility and the European Competitiveness Fund, while stressing the importance of transparency, democratic scrutiny and the introduction of new own resources to finance the EU budget. Interinstitutional negotiations may begin once the Council has agreed on its common position.

The European Commission has adopted the Clean Energy Investment Strategy, with the aim of strengthening the financial framework for the energy transition and mobilising more private capital toward the clean energy sectors. The initiative addresses a particularly high investment need, estimated at €660 billion per year through 2030, and aims to support a more secure, competitive, and decarbonized energy system.

The strategy calls for the use of public resources as leverage to reduce risks, lower financing costs, and attract a broader range of investors. In this context, the EIB Group intends to mobilize over €75 billion over the next three years. Key measures include improving access to capital for electricity network operators, supporting bank lending to smaller operators, backing innovative energy technologies and energy efficiency, and establishing the Energy Transition Investment Council to strengthen dialogue between public institutions and investors.

The European Commission has launched the first operational cycle of the platform for aggregating demand for critical raw materials, under the mechanism established by the Critical Raw Materials Act, with the aim of strengthening the Union’s supply chain security and resilience. This voluntary, market-based instrument enables European companies to pool their demand and connect with suppliers, financial institutions and storage operators, thereby facilitating access to more diversified and competitive sources. The mechanism also provides for demand–supply matching activities, enhanced transparency on available opportunities and support for the development of new strategic projects, including through the involvement of financial partners. As part of the EU's strategy to reduce strategic dependencies, it focuses on raw materials essential to key value chains, such as green and digital technologies, defence, and batteries.

The Council of the European Union has adopted a directive aimed at strengthening coordination between national insolvency regimes, with the aim of reducing existing disparities and improving conditions for investment, particularly in cross-border contexts, within the framework of the Capital Markets Union.

The provisions introduce tools designed to make procedures more efficient and focused on value preservation, addressing both the prevention of prejudicial transactions prior to insolvency and the strengthening of asset tracing mechanisms, including through access to bank account registers. In this context, the Directive also establishes the ‘pre-pack’ procedure, which allows for the preparation of the sale of the business or parts thereof prior to the formal opening of proceedings, facilitating swifter execution and the continuity of essential contracts.

The European Commission has adopted a temporary State aid framework to enable Member States to support the Union’s economy amid the Middle East crisis. The new instrument (METSAF - Middle East crisis Temporary State aid Framework) introduces targeted and temporary measures for the most exposed sectors, including agriculture, fisheries, transport and energy-intensive industries, and will remain in force until 31 December 2026. 

The framework notably allows compensation of up to 70% of additional costs linked to increases in fuel and fertiliser prices, while also providing simplified options for granting limited amounts of aid. It further introduces enhanced flexibility to support energy-intensive industries, including higher aid intensities for electricity costs. The measures, subject to notification, will benefit from fast-track approval procedures.

On 28 April, the European Commission has published the first review of the Digital Markets Act (DMA), confirming that, in its first two years of application, the regulation remains fit for purpose and has already had a positive impact on businesses, developers and users. According to Brussels, the DMA, applied to designated ‘gatekeepers’, has already delivered tangible results thanks to obligations such as data portability, the ability to choose alternative services such as browsers and search engines, and the opening up of digital ecosystems to app stores and third-party services.

In the coming years, the Commission plans to focus on cloud computing and artificial intelligence, strengthening enforcement and working on interoperability, transparency and methods for assessing the regulation’s impact.

Progress is ongoing on the European Competitiveness Fund (ECF), a key component of the EU’s forthcoming multiannual budget and future industrial policy. In this context, the European Parliament has published the briefing Can the European Competitiveness Fund deliver?, at the request of the Committee on Budgets (BUDG). The document offers an initial structured assessment of the proposal, highlighting its potential and limitations.

The briefing identifies several positive aspects, including the attempt to reduce fragmentation in the European financial architecture by introducing a single rulebook, greater standardisation of instruments, strengthening InvestEU, and closer coordination with Horizon Europe. However, the briefing also raises several critical issues, including the absence of a clear prioritisation framework, the risk of resource dispersion, insufficient financial leverage, undefined coordination with other EU instruments, and a governance structure deemed weak in terms of transparency, safeguards, and accountability.

With the entry into force of Directive (EU) 2026/470 on 18 March 2026, the Omnibus I package has become operational, launching a significant review of the European framework on sustainability and sustainable finance.

The intervention particularly affects the CSRD and CSDDD, aiming to reduce compliance burdens and narrow the scope of companies subject to the related obligations.

CSRD (Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive) Amendments

Regarding the CSRD, the new framework limits its scope to large companies exceeding 1,000 employees and €450 million in annual net turnover, significantly reducing the number of entities required to report ESG under European standards. In Italy, the perimeter shrinks to just a few hundred companies, mainly concentrated among major groups and the most economically significant entities.

CSDDD  Amendments

As for the CSDDD, the review introduces more selective criteria, applying due diligence obligations only to companies with at least 5,000 employees and €1.5 billion in turnover. In Italy, the obligations will focus on a very limited number of large operators, excluding almost all SMEs.

The European Commission has presented a proposal for a regulation on the EU Inc., marking the first concrete legislative development of the 28th regime. This optional, digital and harmonised legal framework is designed to facilitate operations within the single market. The main objective of this initiative is to reduce regulatory fragmentation across the 27 national legal systems, by simplifying the establishment, operation and cross-border growth of businesses, particularly for start-ups and scale-ups.

According to the proposal, EU Inc. is a company form that allows for the incorporation of an EU Inc. entirely online within 48 hours, at a maximum cost of €100, with no minimum capital requirements and simplified procedures throughout the company’s entire lifecycle. The regulation also provides for extensive use of digitalisation, the BRIS system and the ‘once-only’ principle to facilitate the cross-border circulation of company information. The proposal confirms the role of national business registers as the competent authorities for registration and the conferral of legal personality, whilst placing them within a more harmonised framework at EU level.

The European Commission has launched two new strategic initiatives to strengthen the future of the maritime sector: the EU Maritime Industrial Strategy and the EU Ports Strategy. Together, these initiatives set out a vision and a series of concrete actions to support and safeguard Europe’s maritime sector, with the aim of enhancing the competitiveness, sustainability and resilience of the entire EU shipping, port and shipbuilding ecosystem.

The Maritime Industrial Strategy is designed to foster innovation, competitiveness and decarbonisation across the shipbuilding and shipping industries. It promotes the uptake of advanced technologies and low-emission fuels, alongside the establishment of a maritime industrial alliance.

The Ports Strategy, in parallel, focuses on modernising European ports through digitalisation, the electrification of infrastructure and better integration with rail and road networks. These changes will be supported by investments in training and workforce reskilling, helping to drive the transition towards a more sustainable and digitalised maritime system.

The European Commission presented the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA), a legislative proposal designed to reinforce the EU's industrial base and to increase demand for low-carbon, European-made technologies and products. The measure introduces "Made in EU" preferences in public procurement for strategic sectors such as steel, cement, cars and net-zero technologies, simplifies authorisations with a single digital gateway and imposes conditions on foreign investments exceeding €100 million, including minimum European employment and technology transfer.

The objective is to minimise external dependencies, encourage innovation and increase the share of manufacturing to 20% of European GDP by 2035.

The European Commission has put forward a new package of measures to strengthen the EU’s cybersecurity, responding to the growing number of cyber and hybrid attacks targeting essential services and democratic institutions. The central element is a revision of the Cybersecurity Act, intended to make ICT (information and communications technology) supply chains more secure and to ensure products and services are protected by design from the outset. The proposal introduces a simpler and faster EU-wide certification system, aimed at reducing costs and administrative burdens for businesses. It also places particular emphasis on limiting risks linked to suppliers from third countries considered sensitive, especially in mobile telecommunications networks. The package further strengthens the role of ENISA (the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity), which will support Member States and businesses in preventing and managing cyber incidents, including ransomware attacks.

Following the signing of the EU–Mercosur Agreement on 17 January, the European Parliament approved a motion to request the judicial review of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in order to verify the agreement’s compliance with the EU Treaties. The referral to the Court could affect the timeline for implementation, potentially delaying the agreement’s entry into force by up to two years.

Cyprus will hold the rotating Presidency of the Council of the European Union from 1 January to 30 June 2026. Its agenda focuses on building a more autonomous and resilient Europe, able to act more effectively in strategic areas—starting with security and defence—while continuing to engage in international dialogue. Another priority is to boost competitiveness through a more efficient Single Market, simpler rules and targeted support for SMEs. The Presidency also highlights innovation and digital transformation as key drivers of growth, alongside investment in skills. Externally, Cyprus aims to strengthen partnerships with third countries and promote a balanced trade policy. It will also pay particular attention to social and territorial cohesion, seen as essential to ensuring fair and inclusive transitions.

On 17 January, the European Union and the Mercosur countries signed a Partnership Agreement (EMPA) and an Interim Trade Agreement (iTA), marking a historic step forward in relations between the two regions. The deal creates one of the largest free trade areas in the world, covering around 700 million consumers and potentially increasing EU exports to Mercosur by an estimated 39%. It also strengthens geopolitical cooperation and support for multilateralism, with expected benefits for economic growth, employment, environmental sustainability, and the green and digital transitions. The agreements must now go through the respective ratification processes in the EU and the Mercosur countries before they can fully enter into force.