The European Commission adopted on, 15 April, a Draft Amending Budget No 3/2020, which aims to enter the budget surplus from 2019 in the 2020 budget.
The implementation of the financial year 2019 shows a surplus of €3.2 billion, which will therefore be entered as revenue in the 2020 budget (€2.4 billion surplus in revenue and €803 million in expenditure).
€2.5 billion comes from fines imposed in the competition cases and interest for late payment (periodic penalty payments and fines).
Budgeting the surplus will reduce the total contribution of the 27 Member States and the United Kingdom to the financing of the 2020 budget by the same amount. The Council of the EU and the European Parliament have to adopt this amending budget.
The European Parliament Committee on Budgets had called for the €3 billion surplus in the 2019 EU budget, which should normally go to the Member States, to be used for the fight against the pandemic (see EUROPE 12455/8).
The EU budget surplus for 2018 was 1.8 billion. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)