Remarks by Commissioner Dombrovskis at the ECOFIN press conference

Thank you, Simon. Good afternoon, everyone.

Let me start by thanking Minister Harris for presenting the Irish Presidency's priorities at today's meeting.

We welcome the important emphasis the work programme places on advancing key files, especially enhancing competitiveness, the digital euro and the Savings and Investments Union.

I look forward to working closely with you on these priorities and more in the months ahead.

I provided today's meeting with an updated assessment of the economic outlook, taking into account the latest indicators and global developments.

Energy prices had fallen since the US–Iran peace agreement in mid-June, with oil prices reaching close to pre-conflict levels at the beginning of this month.

Overall, inflation in the second quarter of this year turned out, on average, slightly below the projections contained in our Spring Forecast.

However, renewed hostilities in recent days have again resulted in a sharp increase in oil prices.

The European Commission will continue to monitor these developments and their impact on growth and inflation very closely. 

Moving to the Recovery and Resilience Facility.

Since our last meeting, we have reached an important milestone.

Denmark has become the first Member State to complete 100% of the measures in its recovery and resilience plan.

We are now approaching the finish line, with just over 50 days left to implement all milestones and targets.

I therefore welcome today's endorsement of targeted amendments that will also help prepare the final payment requests of eight Member States: Latvia, the Netherlands, Lithuania, Cyprus, Germany, Slovenia, Finland, and Luxembourg.

And I also welcome the Council's endorsement of Hungary's ambitious new €10 billion recovery and resilience plan with strong deliverables, including on Rule of Law matters.

Next to Ukraine.

We have already made payments under the Ukraine Support Loan worth more than €7 billion in total.

This includes the first €3.2 billion disbursement under macro-financial assistance announced during the recent Recovery Conference in Gdansk.

The disbursement followed Ukraine's implementation of important and wide-ranging policy reforms aimed at improving its economic resilience.

At the same time as supporting Ukraine, we must also keep exerting maximum pressure on Russia's war economy by swiftly adopting the 21st sanctions package.

Today's meeting took some important steps on the implementation of our economic governance framework.

The Council decided on the existence of an excessive deficit in Bulgaria and made a recommendation for a corrective path to bring its deficit below 3% of GDP by 2029.

The Commission will support Bulgaria's efforts to follow this path and reach our shared goal of ending its excessive deficit.

The Council also endorsed the Netherlands' revised medium-term plan following the Commission's positive assessment.

The Commission also welcomes today's adoption of the country-specific recommendations, addressed to Member States in the context of the European Semester.

These recommendations are targeted at strengthening Europe's overall competitiveness.

Finally, we also held a constructive policy debate on the market integration and supervision package.

This is a key component of the Savings and Investments Union, our strategy to remove barriers and unlock the full potential of the EU's single market for financial services.

We welcome the Irish Presidency's ambition to reach a general approach this autumn.

Thank you.