DMA: effects on EU external trade

Copenhagen Economics is pleased to invite you to a webinar on Thursday 10 June at 3pm (CET). 

The DMA is one of the most important and wide-ranging EU economic policy interventions. As professional economists working on micro- and macro-economic dossiers across the private and public sector, we believe that there is value in studying further the impacts on the EU economy of this significant reform.

The aim of the webinar is to foster an open discussion involving multiple points of view. To contribute to the debate, we will circulate soon a forthcoming paper, which we hope can stimulate the discussion and elicit multiple arguments and perspectives. This paper is commissioned by Google.

Context
Transatlantic trade and relations have suffered during years of tariffs and other barriers. The EU-US Summit marks the beginning of a new phase, kicking off a Trade and Technology Council, aimed at addressing issues of mutual interest before they can cause trade barriers and exports to decline. We are aiming at shedding light on this relationship puzzle by discussing how the proposed Digital Markets Act might cause unwanted frictions in EU exports in general – and in particular on the EU-US trade flows. 

Input for discussion 
The EU has and is still strongly benefiting from a global trading system based on comparative advantages. In this light, key trading partners will see recent moves in EU regulatory policies as being targeted to attain well defined objectives and with careful consideration of possible discriminatory effects. The key question is whether any discriminatory effects of the DMA design criteria is an inevitable consequence of rules set out to promote competition and consumer choice in the first place. Moreover, there are multiple possible impact channels by which the current design of the DMA can risk impair the customer value of the services in scope, hampering productivity among EU businesses that use those services as input to their exported goods and services. 

As a consequence, we find it both necessary and worthwhile to investigate in greater depth how the DMA proposal may impact the EU’s external trade relations as well as the productivity of EU firms. We hope that our forthcoming study can provide a useful initial contribution to this reflection and the valuable policy conversation on the future of the EU external trade. The latter is a demonstrated key driver for the economic welfare of all EU economies, both those sectors and countries at the frontline of EU external trade, as well as all other interconnected sectors and countries via value chains within the EU Single Market.

We look forward to your feedback on our forthcoming paper and we look forward to learn from the debate.

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