Macron’s Paris summit seeks new life for global finance agenda

French President Emmanuel Macron has opened the Summit for a New Global Financial Pact in Paris that seeks to find financial solutions to the interlinked global goals of tackling poverty, curbing planet-heating emissions and protecting nature.

French President Emmanuel Macron hosts a summit on Thursday and Friday to pin down a roadmap for easing the debts burdens of low-income countries while freeing up more funds for climate financing.

The summit brings dozens of leaders together in the French capital to forge a top-level consensus on how to progress a number of initiatives currently struggling in bodies like the G20, IMF-World Bank and United Nations.

Ranging from debt relief to climate finance, many of the topics on the agenda take up suggestions from a group of developing countries, led by Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, dubbed the ‘Bridgetown Initiative’.

“We are moving to a world – I would call it the Bridgetown system of finance – (that) recognises that we have to massively upscale the public sector and focus that on building resilience and adaptation because it’s hard for that to be funded any other way,” said Avinash Persaud, a special envoy for Mottley on climate finance.

Though binding decisions are not expected, officials involved in the summit’s planning said that some strong commitments should be made about financing poor countries.

Nearly eighty years after the Bretton Woods Agreement created the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF), leaders aim to squeeze more financing from multilateral lenders for the countries that need it most.

In particular, there should be an announcement that a $100 billion target has been met that will be made available through the International Monetary Fund for vulnerable countries, officials said.

The plan, first agreed two years ago at an African finance summit in Paris, calls on wealthy governments to lend unused special drawing rights to the IMF to, in turn, lend to poor countries.

Governments are also looking at ways to allow the World Bank to use leverage to lend more to poor countries without putting its top AAA credit rating a risk.

“We want to go farther and should be able to set targets to put more public money on the table,” a French presidency source said.

Malta News:

Agius Saliba requests EC to mitigate price increases due to Brexit

The Maltese consumer should not pay higher prices due to Brexit.  In talks with Labour MEP Alex Agius Saliba, local importers and consumers raised their concerns about increases in prices following the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union in January 2020. In open dialogue with stakeholders, MEP Agius Saliba acknowledged their concerns about the impact of the increase in prices and the technicalities which led to such increases. 

The free trade agreement reached between the European Union and the United Kingdom should – in theory – allow for the free movement of goods and services without any hindrance or added cost. The actual realities faced by local importers are however much different, and many end up paying a tariff of 16.9% – even on products that were made in the EU, exported to the UK and then imported to Malta. Imported goods must satisfy strict criteria on rules of origin to be eligible for the tariff waiver. The exported must prove that a sizeable share of the value of the product (usually around 50%) was produced in the EU or in another country with which the EU has a free trade agreement, such as the UK. Malta’s small size does not make it viable for importers to source the goods involved directly from the country of origin, hence long-standing ties with UK suppliers are used to procure the small quantities needed for the local market.

As MEP Alex Agius Saliba explained, “This anomaly is leading to what I call a Brexit tax, which is not being paid by those who chose to exit the European Union buy by the Maltese consumer, including the most vulnerable in our society”. Labour MEP Agius Saliba has requested the European Commisiion to find a solution for the unique circumstances faced by Malta to ensure that Brexit does not become a burden on Maltese consumers.

Malta Company Announcements:

M&Z p.l.c

A final net dividend of €0.012 per share will be paid on the 23^rd June 2023 to all shareholders as at close of trading on 12^th May 2023.

Hili Properties p.l.c

The Board of directors recommended a final net dividend of €0.0108 per share. Shareholders as at close of trading on Friday 23^rd June 2023 will receive the payment on Tuesday, 18^th July 2023.

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