I think they promised him a new bank.

Well, « shadow of plausible deniability » is a much nicer way of saying the above. bsky.app/profile/luca...

I don't want to blow anyone's mind with insight behind the curtain of international relations here, but in multi-billion dollar deals between gigantic economies, it's pretty useful to have agreed clarity on what the fuck's actually been agreed.

What's the realo version without optimism?

My informed sense, also reflecting the reporting on the negotiations. But of course these negotiations are confidential, so we don't know for sure.

I don't think that is correct. My sense is that member states were very much involved, albeit behind closed doors (which makes sense, given that this was a negotiation situation).

Might or might not be true, but my point is that the chicken resides in Berlin, Paris or Rome rather than in Brussels.

I am all for the COM to take independent stances. But the reality is that in a matter that is perceived as core economic interest by big member states, the COM is not free to do what it likes. It needs said member states ten times a day in other dossiers. In that sense it is very much not the ECB.

That was my point: I think saying the Commission had the choice of doing nothing ignores the political reality that it did not have the necessary backing for that option to be viable. The fact that it is formally in charge does not mean it can do what it wants. It's not the ECB.

I don't think that is how it would have played out. The COM would have gotten under massive fire the moment the new tariffs would have hit from interest groups and from the big exporting member states, and especially the big ones. That is not something the Commission can handle for very long.