Brussels, 10/09/2007 (Agence Europe) - At their informal meeting near Berlin on Monday 10 September, Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy adopted a joint statement seeking to increase the transparency and regulation of financial markets. The German chancellor and the French president called on EU heads of state and government to “act together on all these issues”. Hoping to “prepare the ground ahead of the adoption of decisions at the Spring summit 2008” (Ed: the European Council of March 2008), the two leaders called on the Portuguese presidency to put the topic on the agenda for the informal summit in Lisbon on 18-19 October.
The “alarming levels” taken by “non-tariff obstacles to trade and investment”, and “unfair practices in the global economy, particularly in exchange rates influenced by political considerations,” worry Paris and Berlin, critical of the lack of transparency in hedge funds and the sovereign funds of countries like China, Russia and the Gulf states, which invest in sensitive Western industries. “The opening of markets can only be fully effective if transparent rules encourage fair competition in a spirit of reciprocity,” says the joint text. There had to be encouragement of “the transparency and responsibility of all the players, including rating agencies, at both European and world levels,” continues the statement, calling, in particular, for a “code of conduct for leverage buy-outs” and to assess the “areas in which competition is distorted by sovereign funds”.
“The EU has to act in a consistent way to defend its interests,” Ms Merkel said at a joint press conference. “I am for the market economy, I am for globalisation, I am not for a speculation economy, Mr Sarkozy said, believing that “real market economy is based on transparency and reciprocity”. He said that one should be not be naïve and “there is no reason why Europe should be the only area of the world where everyone can come and help themselves”. (ab)