In the State of the Union address, Ursula von der Leyen shared the key priorities and flagship projects for the year to come, building on the progress the EU has made in recent years and setting out the priorities for the year ahead and her vision for a stronger, more independent and resilient European Union
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AI is the project that could drive European capital markets forward to channel savings where they are needed, says Christine Lagarde. It needs capital on a scale that only markets can provide, and the stakes for Europe could hardly be higher
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Europe is moving towards invoice-level electronic VAT reporting. Thiemo Fetzer argues that, with AI-assisted processing of the information contained in electronic VAT invoices, the tax system can become not just a compliance and revenue-raising instrument, but a protected intelligence map of the economy
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The EU’s implementation of global anti-tax avoidance rules and the global minimum tax is widely regarded as a success. Madalena Barata da Rocha, Roel Dom, Pascal Saint-Amans and Bo Sangers consider the trilemma between tax sovereignty, revenue protection and investment neutrality that has emerged
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The ECB wants central bank money to serve as the monetary anchor for tokenised markets. Piero Cipollone calls for common standards, central bank money and coordinated regulation to prevent blockchain-based finance from becoming a collection of disconnected platforms
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Are American tech billionaires adversaries or role models for Europe? Rebecca Christie writes that the EU should ask what it wants from globally influential tech magnates, not just how to curb them
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The EU’s AI Act was supposed to enter into full effect on 2 August 2026. But while the transparency layer has come into effect, its high-risk regime has been delayed. Marco Perugini argues that the result is a double bind in which Europe loses regulatory sovereignty whether it enforces its own rules or retreats from them
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The Paris Agreement provides a framework for international carbon trading. Georg Zachmann and Annabelle Weisser discuss the many questions that will arise, and argue that international carbon credits can support the EU’s 2040 target if buyers’ club rules and leverage ensure real mitigation gains abroad
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European banking remains fragmented, leaving billions of euros inefficiently allocated. Gyöngyi Lóránth, Anatoli Segura and Jing Zeng argue that a common deposit insurance system can encourage more risk-taking, but this should be accompanied by sufficiently strict supervision
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EU banking rules are under pressure for simplification. Jesper Berg and Hans Geeroms argue that reforms should cut complexity without weakening financial safeguards
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