Just as Feng Xiaochen was sharpening his knife and preparing to go to Europe to buy at the bottom, the European Commission was also holding a hearing to solicit opinions from key European companies on responding to the impact of the subprime mortgage crisis.

"We hope that the EU can provide more support to European companies."

Ximanz Sales Director Albert called out loudly during the hearing.

"Yes, the European market has been sluggish for many years. Before that, we could barely maintain a break-even, but after the subprime mortgage crisis, our order quantity has dropped significantly, and it is highly likely that our company will lose money next year. If the EU cannot provide us with effective support, I think our Pumai company is likely to face the threat of bankruptcy within a few years." Heinzel, the representative of Pumai company, echoed.

Inspired by Heinzl, representatives from other companies also expressed their opinions and competed to show off their misery:

“That’s right. If we can’t get funding from the EU, we will lay off 15,000 employees in three months, which would be a very terrible event.”

"We will have to stop production in five factories. In addition to the workers in these five factories will be fired, there are no less than 120 companies providing supporting services to these five factories, and their workers will also face the risk of unemployment."

"There will be layoffs!"

“We are likely to file for bankruptcy protection!”

“We are one of the oldest businesses in Europe and if our company goes bankrupt, it will be a major loss to the European industrial tradition.”

Everyone started to clamor, one more alarmist than the other. Everyone knows that this is a good time to put pressure on the EU. No matter whether the company is really facing danger or not, it is always without any harm to say it seriously. Being able to obtain funding from the EU is simply a waste of benefits, so why not? What's more, the market downturn is a fact, and almost no company can survive alone.

Bovad, an EU official who presided over the meeting, frowned and recorded the opinions of the company representatives one by one. Of course, he also knew that these people's words were somewhat exaggerated, and they all wanted to make the EU pay for their losses. But the EU does this kind of thing. These large companies have the right to speak in Europe. How dare the EU violate the will of these large companies? Also, if these companies really have problems such as large layoffs, the EU will also be the scapegoat.

"I heard everyone's opinions."

After everyone's narrative ended, Bovard tapped his small notebook with the tip of his pen and said to everyone: "The question now is, what kind of support do you want the EU to provide? I mean, I need to know some specific practices, rather than asking for funding in general."

"In fact, what we need most is the market." Albert replied first, his words aroused widespread approval, and everyone nodded desperately to express their agreement with this request.

"Market? I don't understand, how do you need the European Commission to solve market problems for you?" Bovard said.

"Due to the subprime mortgage crisis, European corporate investment has decreased, and our company's product orders have dropped by 30%. In this case, unless we close some factories, the fixed costs of these factories alone will cause us to suffer serious losses. To change this situation, we must obtain markets outside Europe, especially the US market."

Hearing this request, Bovad smiled bitterly and said, "Mr. Albert, it is completely impossible for us to obtain the US market. The US Department of Commerce has been negotiating with us in this section, hoping that we will open the market to the US. You are a power generation equipment, and you should know that several new power plants in the United States have been strictly required by the government, restricting them from purchasing equipment produced locally in the United States."

"These hateful Americans!" a businessman present cursed, "They kept saying that they were our allies, but when they were in trouble, they were not trying to share the pressure for their allies, but to transfer their own pressure to their allies. Have we still had less burdens for the Americans over the years?"

"I think this is something that should be considered by the Council of Ministers. I am just an ordinary business official." Bovard shrugged and said that he would not take the blame. Because the blame was too big and not something his small body could bear.

Regarding European and American relations, Boward learned much more about the situation than the merchants present. He knew that during this period, the US government has been putting pressure on the EU to relax trade barriers and adopt a monetary austerity policy. In contrast, the US itself is increasing trade barriers and adopting quantitative easing policies to attract international hot money to invest in the United States. EU officials all know that the Americans' approach is to sacrifice European interests to help the United States get rid of the crisis as soon as possible.

Faced with the unreasonable demands of the United States, the EU really has no confidence to refuse. Europe's security is based on the protection of the United States. Without the protection of Americans, Europe will face the threat of Russian force alone. Although the strength of this polar bear has been greatly reduced after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it is still more than enough to defeat an EU. In recent times, the United States has taken many small actions against Russia, constantly stimulating the iron-fisted leader of Russia, which is actually scaring the EU in disguise and letting the EU know that it cannot do without the United States.

After understanding these, Bovad could only say that he could not help the demands of various companies to enter the US market. It would be good that the EU can protect its own market from being eroded by Americans, so how could he dare to think about entering the US market?

"Since that's the case, then we can take a step back and hope that the EU can help us open up the markets of developing countries, especially the Chinese market." Albert said. His previous proposal to enter the US market was actually a means of bargaining. Bovard rejected the previous request, so it was inconvenient to reject his next request.

Sure enough, Bovad looked embarrassed and said, "Mr. Albert, I don't understand why you asked the European Commission to help you open up the market. Isn't opening up the market a business?"

“No, it’s not just a business act,” Albert said. “For the past decade, the Chinese have developed their own equipment industry by stealing our technology. Now, not only have they achieved import substitution and no longer used our equipment, but they have also seized our traditional markets in Asia, Africa and South America. Because they are using immoral competitive means, we have no advantage in the competition.”

"Can you tell me about immoral competition in detail?" Bovard asked.

"For example, they violated regulations on employee welfare protection in production. It is understood that their workers work 12 hours a day and earn less than 2 euros an hour. They use this method to lower the cost of equipment and thus defeat us in the price war."

"Yes, I also heard that their workers have very poor working conditions. The coffee break rooms that are very common in European companies are completely non-existent in Chinese companies."

"Also, they use a lot of coal to generate electricity, polluting the entire earth's air!"

“They imitate our brand!”

Everyone started to criticize China with one mouthful of chickens and one mouthful of ducks. The degree of indignation was comparable to that of someone's "seven major hatreds" hundreds of years ago. They completely forgot that just six or seven years ago, most Europeans thought that Chinese were really stupid and naive. The products produced by Chinese were so cheap, and they were simply working for Europeans for free.

"We hope that the EU will initiate a strict review of Chinese-made products, including intellectual property review, environmental system review and social responsibility system review. Chinese companies that cannot meet EU standards will be prohibited from entering the EU market... and other markets of other countries that have signed trade agreements with us." Heinzel said, and as he spoke the last sentence, he stuttered clearly.

The EU can formulate its own policies, but it is a bit difficult to make these policies affect other countries. However, if this restriction does not include other countries outside the EU, especially the vast majority of developing countries, then the significance of the restriction is really not very great. As the European market enters the cold winter, what everyone wants is to seize the market of developing countries, so their biggest goal is to let the EU help them squeeze China out of these developing countries' markets.

"I will submit your opinions to the European Commission for discussion." Bovad nodded to everyone and said: "However, the help the European Commission can provide to everyone is limited after all. I hope you can take more active measures to effectively control costs and win the market with your own strength. I am full of confidence in European companies."

The hearing ended like this. As for what kind of response the European Commission can respond to the demands of enterprises, the representatives of the participating companies were not sure. The European Commission will definitely support European companies, and everyone is not worried about this, but the cumbersome and inefficient decision-making procedures of the European Commission are obvious to all. The request they put forward today may not be able to enter the committee's agenda in half a year, and then there will be a long dispute. It is normal for a year or two to be involved. Even if there is a resolution in the end, the resolution will still require approval from the parliament of the EU countries. I don't know what kind of monsters will be created during this period.

Everyone exchanged complaints about the EU decision-making system and walked outside the conference room. Heinzel walked over to Bovard:

"Mr. Bowad, I have another thing to report to the European Commission, about the Captain Cook project for deep-sea oil development. Can you give me ten minutes?"
Chapter completed!