Export control / embargoes

For ex­port-ori­en­ted com­pa­nies, the pro­vi­si­ons of the For­eign Trade and Pay­ments Act (Außen­wirt­schafts­ge­setz, AWG), the For­eign Trade and Pay­ments Or­di­nance (Außen­wirt­schafts­ver­ord­nung, AWV) and the EU Dual-Use Re­gu­la­tion are par­ti­cu­larly re­le­vant to the ques­tion of which goods may only be ex­por­ted with a li­cence. Howe­ver, ex­port pro­jects must also al­ways take into ac­count the so­me­ti­mes con­side­ra­ble re­stric­tions on for­eign trade (em­bar­goes) re­sul­ting from in­ter­na­tio­nal eco­no­mic and fi­nan­cial sanc­tions against in­di­vi­dual sta­tes or cer­tain per­sons, for ex­am­ple from re­so­lu­ti­ons of the Eu­ro­pean Union or re­so­lu­ti­ons of the United Na­ti­ons.

Investment control

In ad­di­tion, as the lar­gest eco­nomy in Eu­rope, Ger­many con­ti­nues to be an at­trac­tive de­sti­na­tion for for­eign in­vest­ment. Howe­ver, the ac­qui­si­tion of a Ger­man com­pany or the par­ti­ci­pa­tion in a Ger­man com­pany by a for­eign ac­tor is sub­ject to scru­tiny by the Fe­deral Mi­nis­try of Eco­no­mics and Cli­mate Pro­tec­tion (BMWK). This is be­cause the Fe­deral Go­vern­ment wants to en­sure that such for­eign di­rect in­vest­ments do not pose a th­reat to the pu­blic or­der and se­cu­rity of the Fe­deral Re­pu­blic of Ger­many. This endea­vour has led to a num­ber of si­gni­fi­cant tigh­te­ning of the le­gal re­qui­re­ments in Ger­man in­vest­ment con­trol law, es­pe­cially since 2017. Against this back­drop, the Fe­deral Go­vern­ment has re­cently in­ter­ve­ned in plan­ned ac­qui­si­tion tran­sac­tions on va­rious oc­ca­si­ons or has pro­hi­bi­ted them com­ple­tely. In ad­di­tion, the Eu­ro­pean Union has also crea­ted a le­gal frame­work since 2019 with the so-cal­led EU Scree­ning Re­gu­la­tion, which ob­li­ges the mem­ber sta­tes and the EU Com­mis­sion to coope­rate in their na­tio­nal in­vest­ment re­view pro­ce­du­res. The ex­ami­na­tion of the ac­qui­si­tion of Ger­man com­pa­nies by for­eign ac­tors has thus be­come con­side­ra­bly more com­plex wi­thin a few years. When plan­ning and pre­pa­ring cross-bor­der M&A tran­sac­tions, an early ex­ami­na­tion of the re­spec­tive re­qui­re­ments of for­eign trade law ac­qui­si­tion con­trol is the­re­fore es­sen­tial.

Control of third-country subsidies

In ad­di­tion, the EU Re­gu­la­tion on Third State Sub­si­dies Dis­tor­ting the In­ter­nal Mar­ket (so-cal­led For­eign Sub­si­dies Re­gu­la­tion) has been in force since mid-2023. With this in­stru­ment, the Eu­ro­pean Union wants to pre­vent state-sub­si­di­sed com­pa­nies from non-EU sta­tes from dis­tor­ting com­pe­ti­tion wi­thin the Eu­ro­pean sin­gle mar­ket. To achieve this goal, the re­gu­la­tion in­tro­du­ces, among other things, a prior no­ti­fi­ca­tion re­qui­re­ment for mer­gers above cer­tain th­res­holds. In cross-bor­der M&A tran­sac­tions, com­pa­nies must the­re­fore not only keep an eye on the re­qui­re­ments of in­vest­ment con­trol un­der for­eign trade law, but also check at an early stage whe­ther the scope of ap­pli­ca­tion of the For­eign Sub­si­dies Re­gu­la­tion is ope­ned up and whe­ther no­ti­fi­ca­tion ob­li­ga­ti­ons arise from this.

We pro­vide you with com­pre­hen­sive sup­port on all is­sues re­la­ting to for­eign trade and cross-bor­der busi­ness ac­tivi­ties. If ne­cessary, we in­volve our ex­perts from other areas of law (in par­ti­cu­lar tax, an­ti­trust and cu­st­oms law) and ad­vi­sory di­sci­plines.