How Elon Musk made eastern Germany great again (POLITICO)
By Wilhelmine Preussen · Oct 11, 2023 GRUNHEIDE, Germany — Grünheide isn’t a household name, even in Germany — but Elon Musk’s announcement four years ago that he’d build Tesla’s first European gigafactory near the eastern German town put it on the map. Now French President Emmanuel Macron, Italian PM Giorgia Meloni and Turkish President […]
Meet the farmers who control one-third of the EU’s budget (POLITICO)
By Bartosz Brzeziński, Paula Andrés · Oct 6, 2023 BRUSSELS — Franc Bogovič spent 16 years selling pesticides. Now he’s leading the charge in Brussels against an EU master plan to wean farmers off them. The 60-year-old European lawmaker lives in the Kozjanski Park — a biodiversity hotspot in eastern Slovenia that is protected under […]
Could Trump use forgotten Chinese debt to salvage the global economy?
As the United States confronts an impending government shutdown amid an unwelcome outbreak of bond vigilantism, an unexpected remedy to global financial implosion might just lie in a murky corner of long forgotten financial history. Dormant for decades, the Blind Spot understands the overlooked issue of defaulted Chinese imperial debt is quietly turning heads on […]
The problem with Ozempic, a personal story
If you’ve not heard of it, semaglutide (also known as Ozempic, Wegovy) is the wonder weight loss drug that is currently storming the world, and even Boris Johnson seems to think it has revolutionised the treatment of obesity, meaning the problem could be nipped in the bud very soon. As someone who struggles with weight […]
Poland’s PiS under fire for massaging inflation data (POLITICO)
By Ben Munster, Izabella Kaminska · Sep 28, 2023, A high-stakes electoral gamble over inflation by Poland’s central bank may be about to pay off, with preliminary September figures on Friday expected to show a large slowdown in consumer price rises, supporting the central bank’s contentious decision to aggressively cut rates earlier this month. But […]
Solar sector calls for €100M EU bailout as Chinese competition pushes it to the brink (POLITICO)
By Victor Jack · Sep 11, 2023 BRUSSELS — The EU should step in and spend €100 million on solar panels made by European companies faced with an imminent wave of bankruptcies thanks to intensifying Chinese competition and slowing demand in Europe. The industry’s main lobby in Brussels, SolarPower Europe, on Monday sent a letter […]
Fake Ozempic and Wegovy surge in Europe — but regulators have limited powers to act (POLITICO)
By Ashleigh Furlong, Helen Collis · Sep 8, 2023 It was only a matter of time. Soaring demand for a drug touted by online influencers to help lose weight, but whose supplies in Europe are restricted, has caused a surge in fake and potentially dangerous concoctions of the injection, putting lives at risk. In the […]
EU boosts imports of Russian LNG despite phaseout pledge (POLITICO)
By Victor Jack · Aug 30, 2023 Russian sales of liquefied natural gas to the EU hit record levels this year despite the bloc’s efforts to cut back on energy imports from Moscow, new data shows. EU countries bought 9.5 million tons of LNG from Russia from January to July, according to the Kpler market […]
In the Blind Spot (Jackson Hole meets Alpbach)
Dear Subscribers, Welcome to the end of August. It’s Jackson Hole weekend. But it’s also the European Forum at Alpbach in Austria, where I have finally arrived. My Alpine location is one of the reasons the newsletter is coming on a Sunday. My arrival at Munich was scuppered on Thursday night by electrical storms, which […]
Russian oil titan Lukoil eyes the end of its reign in Bulgaria (POLITICO)
By Victor Jack · Aug 21, 2023 BURGAS, Bulgaria — Russia’s largest private oil company Lukoil casts an immense economic and political shadow over Bulgaria — but the energy major’s privileged position in the Balkan country is in growing danger. That’s because a derogation from EU oil sanctions enjoyed by its Bulgarian branch runs out […]