The EU’s secret deregulation movement
Hello and welcome to the latest edition of The Counterbalance newsletter. Today we’re looking at the EU’s plan to win the global tech race.
It has been a promising stretch for those of us invested in the fight against monopoly power.
In the space of two weeks, a US court has ruled Google to have an illegal monopoly in the online advertising space, and Europe fined Apple and Meta a near-combined $800 million under the bloc’s marquee competition regulations.
But this week, we were served a reminder that the fight against unchecked corporate power is far from over — and sometimes — our attention must turn to those whose job it is to protect markets and consumers in the first place.
Details about the EU’s long touted plan to maintain “competitiveness” in a global tech market was partly revealed by POLITICO muckrakers earlier this week, and the takeaways from a “draft communication” paint a bleak picture.
According to the draft, dubbed an “international digital strategy for Europe”, the European Commission’s quest to cut red tape and bureaucracy has been hailed as “unprecedented efforts to simplify” regulations to help Europe “flourish” and “scale up”.
This language sits in obvious, and alarmingly stark contrast to the public sentiment pushed in recent weeks by Teresa Ribera, Executive VP of the European Commission for a Clean, Just and Competitive Transition.
Just last month, the Commission’s top voice on competition stood firm against US criticism that the Digital Markets Act was about levying tax against American companies instead of protecting consumers across the bloc.
“The DMA is not intended to go against anyone, but to ensure there is room to facilitate protection for users,” Ribera said, adding that “[she] will defend Europeans, European business and European citizens.”
Following the DMA’s groundbreaking fines against Meta and Apple, Ribera also told members of the European Parliament that Big Tech will have “less and less excuses” for breaching European competition standards.
But despite strong words spoken by Ribera in public, European lawmakers are sitting behind the scenes saying something very different: that an “unprecedented effort to simplify” regulations will achieve the bloc’s lofty ambitions on tech.
As we have seen throughout history, there is no evidence to suggest that deregulation offers anything other than rewards for big business.
It is simply not true that regulation stifles growth, nor is it true that deregulation leads to innovation. The reality is that regulation — when used properly — provides guardrails that facilitate sustainable growth in a way that does not harm consumers.
Take the recent example of crypto and digital assets. The nascent sector was the “next big thing” in tech and finance only a few short years ago, but after a decade of loose oversight and unsustainable growth, the market imploded and wreaked havoc on consumers worldwide.
The draft memo also exposes how EU lawmakers are thinking the global tech race and its importance relative to other European priorities. According to the document, Europe’s race for tech dominance is happening amidst a “backsliding of democracy, trade wars, increasing cyber and hybrid threats and the use of dual use technologies on the battlefield.”
This paragraph serves as a reminder that the fight against monopoly power is as much about resetting the terms of the debate as it is about holding specific companies to account for bad behaviour.
The Commission’s “unprecedented efforts to simplify” red tape are no longer just about deregulation for economic growth, but about using a confected crisis to justify deregulation in the first place.
It becomes very easy for policymakers to peddle a myth that we need to get out of an industry’s way when we need its help to face down key — sometimes existential — geopolitical threats, such as a “backsliding of democracy” or “cyber and hybrid threats”.
Again, this is simply not true. Europe does not need to bend over backwards for any industry, including tech, to face down crises. The opposite it true: regulated competition — the kind which Teresa Ribera speaks of publicly and which this draft document does not — is what Europe needs to place at the forefront of its digital strategy.
It is important that we remember not to cede this ground, for if we do, we will lose the fight against monopoly power before it even begins.
Weekly highlights: An update on the EU’s Google investigation
A final word on Teresa Ribera: when asked by German Greens lawmaker Alexandra Geese about DG Comp’s Google investigation, Ribera said the Commission’s case is “quite advanced”, but did not specify a timeframe for when a decision will arrive. In this MLex piece, Ribera added the EU’s recent fines against Apple and Meta serve as a “learning curve” for the bloc’s Digital Markets Act and its use.
The Indian government is calling on the nation’s private sector to take the reins on technology and innovation in a response to the country lagging behind China’s tech sector. “The government can only enable the ecosystem. The actual work is done by the industry, startups, and researchers,” Abhishek Sing, CEO of IndiaAI Mission told Rest of World.
Soundbite of the week: Bluesky over X in Spain
The Counterbalance spotted a positive step in the right direction this week when Spanish minister Sara Aagesen took to Bluesky — over X — to post updates about the nationwide blackout which struck the southern European country earlier this week.
“The Spanish Government is working to restore power…we continue working with the National Security Council and the Electricity Network to restore normality as soon as possible.”
It is worth noting Aagesen’s decision. It sets a powerful precedent for politicians to live-post updates about a national crisis on a social media platform other than X.
The data behind 2025’s M&A story so far:
Per venture capital database PitchBook, global mergers and acquisitions registered “robust growth” in the first quarter of 2025, reaching a combined deal value of $1,050.8 billion across 12,371 transactions, setting this year up to be an even bigger year for M&A than 2024.
North American M&A activity dominated the global scene in Q1, registering roughly 80% of the period’s deals. However, it remains to be seen whether the White House’s aggressive stance on tariffs will pour cold water on US-led deals later in the year.
This data reminds us that private equity and venture capital can play a major role in the creation of monopolies: private funds can quickly digest promising startups in small sectors, effectively eliminating competition for the most powerful market participants.
The Counterbalance is published every Thursday. Please send any thoughts and feedback to scott@balancedeconomy.org.