The Council of Ministers has approved this Tuesday a royal decree that develops the so-called anti-opa shield that was deployed with the Covid-19 pandemic to prevent the entry of foreign capital into companies considered strategic and that served, among other things, for Naturgy to stop the division of assets that its Geminis project contemplated.
As explained by the Government, the regulations approved today establish "clear, predictable Spanish investment control regulations with greater legal certainty".
The decision develops the national regulatory framework that changed with the introduction of article 7 bis of Law 19/2003 in 2020, which suspends the liberalization regime of certain foreign direct investments in Spain that are subject to prior authorization.
"The objective of this regulation is to adapt to the framework of the European Union and give greater transparency and confidence to international investment statistics in Spain," said the Minister of Industry, Trade and Tourism, Héctor Gómez.
The approved text specifies what type of foreign companies and operations do or do not need to request an investment authorization from the administration. In addition, a series of exemptions to the prior authorization regime are established in line with what is established in the European framework.
The resolution period goes from the current six months to three months. In addition, the possibility of voluntary consultation is foreseen, binding for the administration and with a response period of 30 business days.
“2022 has been the second best year in attracting foreign investment since data was available. 34,000 million euros arrived and in the first quarter of 2023 they already reached 10,000 million, which implies an improvement on last year's data and reflects that Spanish regulation is attractive for international investment”, Gómez assured.
The royal decree approved this Tuesday allows the investor to reduce the burdens and possible administrative obstacles and the response and resolution periods are reduced, which was one of the main demands of companies and investors.
The Minister of Industry has also confirmed that he anticipates that in the first 15 days of July the window will be available to present the projects that compete in the second call for the electric vehicle part, known as Part VEC II.
Gómez has detailed that block A of the second call for Perte VEC II, related to batteries, will have 850 million euros, of which 550 million are grants and the remaining 287 are granted in the format of loans.
In addition, the European Commission has published the new exception regulation by categories that allows block B to be removed from Perte VEC II, aimed at specific projects related to the promotion of electric vehicles. "Once the regulation has been published, we begin the procedure by the delegated commission and we will also announce both the call and the final publication of this block B, VEC II call", confirmed the minister.
