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Last Ecofin Council during the Danish Presidency, it is my pleasure to introduce Minister for Economic Affairs, Mr.

Stephanie Lose, and Commissioner for Economy and Productivity, Mr. Valdis Dombrovskis.

I'll first give the floor to the Minister and then to the Commissioner for brief remarks.

I have to say that we are on a very tight schedule due to other obligations, but we'll try to get as many questions as possible.

That's also why I'll keep my part short.

I would just thank my colleagues for a constructive Ecofin meeting and also the cooperation throughout the Danish Presidency.

We have taken important steps on several files and moved the European Union forward in areas that matter when it comes to our security and our competitiveness.

The top priority is still support for Ukraine.

Last night we discussed economic aspects of the Commission's proposal on financing and hopefully helped pave the way for an agreement at the European Council next week.

In our discussions, many colleagues expressed clear support for the Commission's approach, while also acknowledging that further technical work is needed,

and will continue to work intensively to facilitate an agreement at the European Council next week.

It's an obligation for us to support Ukraine in its fight for freedom and indeed it's also vital to wider European security.

Mr President, I'm happy to report that we expect Council agreement on the digital euro as a major result during the Danish Presidency,

we took stock today of the Presidency solution and we expect finalization of the technical work next week.

It's a way to provide a simple, secure, low-cost digital means of payment,

strengthening European strategic autonomy and economic security through an independent digital payment infrastructure.

We also, as another major result, made progress on the Savings and Investments Union, where we agreed on the securitization file,

providing enhanced financial sector support to the real economy,

and then we discussed the Commission's proposals on capital market infrastructure and efficient supervision.

We agreed on a temporary measure to abolish the €150 customs duty relief threshold not in 2028 as it was thought to be done permanently,

but from 2026 as soon as possible.

A quick solution that was necessary because many Member States are seeing local shops closed due to large volumes of low cost imports with no customs duty,

especially from China, and we need to ensure fair competition,

and we demonstrated that we can act quickly and decisively when needed.

The temporary measure will be a €3 fee per parcel imported to the European Union.

We need to get the technical work in place moving forward from here.

It was an agreement that had wide support among Member States and the Commission.

On the simplification agenda, we discussed the economic impact of new EU legislation.

We need to keep a close look and monitor the incoming flow of new regulation to make sure that we do not put excessive burdens on our businesses across Europe.

As well as public authorities,

and we adopted Council conclusions on simplifying the Union's Financial Services regulation as well.

We started that discussion at the informal Ecofin in Copenhagen in December and today.

We highlight in our conclusions the need for more streamlined financial rules while preserving core safeguards, such as capital requirements that protect financial stability,

and we also call for simplification packages for the Union's Financial regulation in line with the European Council's request and set out principles for future regulation.

So in sum, today's Ecofin has marked progress on several of the EU's most important economic files, and I want to thank my colleagues for their cooperation and commitment,

and we will continue to work in the coming days to complete even more files from here. Thank you. Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone.

Indeed, our final Ecofin meeting of 2025 has had a, a packed agenda.

I will begin with a most pressing priority.

Last night I presented the Commission's legislative proposals to provide flexible,

urgent and vital financing to Ukraine.

I also outlined the strong guarantees and safeguards embedded in our reparations loan proposal.

These are in place to respond to concerns expressed by certain member states,

notably Belgium, and financial institutions to provide protection from possible retaliatory actions.

I also set out how the proposals are legally robust, in line with EU and international law,

and underpinned by Ukraine meeting essential preconditions to receive the support.

I welcome the broad support expressed for this during our yesterday's meeting,

and we also continue to work on addressing the remaining concerns of certain Member States.

These exchanges provide a useful basis for the next week's EU leaders meeting where we must reach a clear commitment on the way forward.

Ukraine's needs are not only sizeable but also urgent,

so I urge member states to show unity and act now.

We also took stock on the state of play of the single currency package.

Discussions have progressed well, paving the way for the Council general approach to be formalized shortly.

This is an important step,

and we now need to make the most of the current momentum to complete the legislative process and facilitate the necessary preparations for the introduction of the digital euro.

This is urgent and essential also in light of the current geopolitical environment.

At the last Ecofin in November we agreed to move forward with the removal of the customs duty exemption on low value parcels and to work on a simple temporary solution for calculating customs duties on these goods.

And following up on that today,

ministers have approved an imposition of €3 duty on low value consignments.

This temporary solution will apply from July 2026 till the EU customs data hub functionalities are ready,

which may happen in 2028.

This represents an important step towards ensuring a level playing field for European businesses.

Commission services will work with the Member States to help make transitory measures legally and practically applicable.

Moving now to fiscal surveillance,

I provided the Commission's assessment on effective action for the 9 member states in the excessive deficit procedure.

For Romania,

we acknowledge the significant fiscal measures adopted over the summer and therefore the Commission will not at this stage propose a suspension of EU funds under the macroeconomic conditionality procedure.

For Malta and Hungary, we see risks of deviations from the path recommended by the council that require attention,

and this may require a stepping up of the procedure in spring 2026.

I also presented the Commission's report under Article 1263 assessing compliance with the deficit criterion.

It finds that the opening of an excessive deficit procedure for Finland is warranted,

and the Economic and Financial Committee has confirmed this conclusion.

On that basis,

the Commission has earlier today proposed the necessary procedural steps to establish the existence of excessive deficit and issued a recommendation to Finland to put an end to the excessive deficit situation.

Including, provided as a corrective net expenditure pass.

Moving to recovery and resilience facility,

we provided our regular update and entering the final year of the RRF should focus mines.

Today I strongly encourage member states to accelerate implementation and simplify plans where possible,

and I therefore welcome today's endorsement of targeted amendments to the recovery and resilience plans of 10 member states Austria,

Cyprus, Czechia, France, Greece, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Portugal, and Slovenia.

We also had a useful exchange on the importance of closely monitoring the costs and benefits of EU legislation,

and there I also emphasized the importance to assess the impact of substantial amendments introduced during the legislative process to avoid creating additional significant costs and burdens.

We welcome the conclusions adopted today on a simpler and more effective financial regulation.

The Commission has also taken note of yesterday's recommendations from the ECB's Governing Council's High Level Task Force on simplification,

and Commission services are currently assessing these recommendations.

Of course,

the most effective simplification efforts in this area will come from removing intra-EU barriers and creating a real single market for financial services.

On the savings and Investments union,

the Commission presented the market infrastructure and efficient supervision for a package which was adopted last week.

Our proposals seek to build a more competitive and effective financial services sector in Europe to stimulate growth and enhance competitiveness,

and we call on member states to advance these important initiatives.

To conclude, I would like to thank Minister Losser and the Danish Presidency for their commitment,

for your professionalism over the past 6 months,

and for the significant progress you have made in advancing our common agenda and priorities. Thank you very much, Commissioner. Now let's open the floor for questions. I'll start by here.

No, Please start by stating your name and.

Yes, thank you so much, Valentin Vasilev at CVP Vak.

Question for Commissioner, you mentioned that you presented yesterday safeguards,

regarding, to potential retaliation measures, from Russia.

Today Russian Central Bank already went to Moscow arbitrary court.

Against Euroclear, so do you have, first of all, what, what is your reaction on that, and do you have any safeguards, from this? What, what can happen next? Thank you.

First of all,

let me recall that generally our proposal is legally robust and fully in line with the EU and public international law.

The assets are not seized and the principle of sovereign immunity is respected.

Let me recall also that Russians Central Bank assets held in the EU,

including in central depositories such as Euroclear are immobilized in line with the EU sanctions Member states have followed since the start of Russia's illegal war of aggression.

This again is in line with both EU and international law,

and EU financial institutions holding these immobilized assets are fully protected from legal proceedings.

Specifically, under our current sanctions, EU CSDs, central security depositories,

can offset any seizure in Russia with frozen assets or immobilized assets held here.

We can expect that Russia will continue to launch speculative legal proceedings to prevent the EU from upholding international law and to pursue the legal obligation for Russia to compensate Ukraine for the damages it has caused them.

This is why both in our current sanctions regime but also in the proposals that we made last week, we have included.

Additional protection for EU financial institutions holding these immobilized Russian Central Bank assets. Thank you. Thank you so much. I'll go for Euronews, please. Thank you, Jorge Liboreiro with Euronews.

Questions on on the reparations loan for the minister.

Yesterday you approved the 1 to 2 article to indefinitely mobilize the assets, for the foreseeable future.

Do you think this development is good news for the reparations loan?

Did you feel that in the room today that the loan is now closer or, or is joint debt still on the table?

And for the commissioner we know that Belgium is very preoccupied with any prospects of retaliation like the one my colleague just mentioned.

They want guarantees to be essentially open-ended, infinite in scope and time.

Is this something that the Commission is willing to provide open-ended guarantees or is this a line that you're not willing to cross? Thank you both.

From the Danish Presidency, we consider the process to put the immobilization of the frozen Russian assets on a more safe footing,

so to say, as a natural follow up on the European Council meeting of October.

The decision is now in a written procedure, so we can conclude finance, but it's my impression that there's broad support among Member States for that,

and that's irrespective of what the financing situation for Ukraine will be,

because delivering on mobilizing.

The frozen Russian assets further along is basically also an answer to the fact that as long as Russia hasn't paid war reparations and as long as they have an illegal war in Ukraine.

Then we have decided that they should remain immobilized, and that's what we are ensuring now.

That's the first step and a natural follow up in the European Council,

and then we'll have the financing discussion in a separate matter, so to say.

Yes, indeed, maybe just to compliment, indeed this is now a standing immobilization of Russian assets obviously puts all the work on reparation loans on a more solid footing as we will not be relying solely on the EU's sanctions regime which For a rollover of those sanctions every 6 months,

so that certainly provides a more solid basis for work on guarantees.

I was already outlining at the very beginning that we are putting forward solid guarantees for Belgium and also financial institutions.

In our proposal, but from the Commission side we are open to work further and see how to further accommodate Belgium's concerns,

and this work is ongoing as we speak. We have time for one last question. We'll go for Alexandra, please. Well, thank you, Fabric for the floor.

One question regarding the reparations loan, following yesterday's decisions and today's discussions, do you both believe, Commissioner and Minister, that, next week there will be, a final agreement,

among the 26 or 27 EU member states,

and one small clarification regarding the A decision of today's council regarding the parcels that €3 go per item or per parcel. Thank you so much. Do you want to start?

Yes, so, on, on Ukraine funding, well, it is critical that we find a solution, and it's,

it's important that this work is finalized next week because as I was Mentioning before,

Ukraine is facing not only very sizable but also urgent funding needs.

Already now we can expect if decisions are taken next week that this funding can start flowing to Ukraine in the 2nd quarter of next year.

So currently we are also in contact with.

Our G7 partners and other international donors to see if they can frontload their financial assistance to the first quarter of next year in a sense to provide a certain bridging by the time the EU financial assistance will actually start reaching Ukraine.

And we are making progress on this and it looks we will be able to cover the financing needs for Ukraine for the first quarter,

but it's critical that we reach an agreement next week to also provide this funding and necessary assurances for the next 2 years.

Yes, and I think it's important to say, as the Commission has said on other occasions,

that doing nothing in terms of Ukraine is also doing something.

So basically, it's an obligation for the European Union to deliver on financing for Ukraine one way or another,

so the job is to make sure that we deliver on that, and I think all Member States.

Highly aware that if we are not able to deliver on that, that comes with enormous consequences for Ukraine,

but indeed also for Europe, because we already feel the effects of the war.

I think we have to foresee that the effects will be even more severe for European security if we are not able to help Ukraine. Fanny Elis. Thank you. Good afternoon. Quick question on simplification, to Mrs.

Sosa, what will be the, the council's, follow up of, today's conclusion and simplification concretely? And to Mr.

Dombrovskis, are you ready to put forward a simplification omnibus on financial services as requested for the second time by the council? Thank you.

During the Danish Presidency,

we worked hard to give a transparent overview of all the new flow of EU regulation underway.

The omnibuses address the regulation already in place, simplifying those.

It's just as important that we are sure that while we remove burdens in the simplification process with the omnibuses,

we do not just add more with the other.

In the new flow of regulation, so we made this transparent overview that have Council conclusions in the General Affairs Council next week,

and that should be the foundation for having a regular discussion under every new Presidency on the current state of play of new regulation and the burdens on the way.

We are sure that we have an eye for the proportions between the obvious benefits that come from EU regulation,

but the costs that follow, on the other hand, if those proportions are right.

We'll have that discussion at the Ecofin to see the overall economic overview, but of course,

also at the Compet having the responsibility for the business part and also with the views of the General Affairs Council.

I could just indeed welcome this Danish Presidency initiative to do this assessment and tracking of costs and benefits of EU legislation and as I understand there was some The discussion and agreement with the Cypriot presidencies that this work will be continued and this monitoring will be continued going forward.

I think it's important that when we are making legislative decisions, those are informed decisions.

And therefore it's important that this work on simplification,

also tracking the burdens of EU legislation remains an integral part of our work and our working methods.

On financial services, financial services, I would highlight a few things.

First, we are preparing a communication on the competitiveness in our financial and banking sector for presumably the second half of the next year.

We will be assessing different factors affecting this.

I also mentioned that the European Central Bank's Governing Council High Level Task Force on simplification just published its recommendations,

so we are also currently assessing these recommendations because some of them also may require legislative changes if a decision is taken to follow through.

Recommendations,

so this work on assessment of financial sector legislation is taking place and if necessary can be followed up with legislative changes.

We'll have to conclude now. Thank you so much. Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you, Minister. OK.