Giorgetti says EU consensus building on energy windfall tax
Italy's finance minister points to growing support among member states for a tax on energy companies' profits
Published
Italian Finance Minister Giorgetti says a consensus is building within the European Union for a windfall tax on the energy sector.
Giorgetti has been pressing the case for weeks. On August 22 he joined finance ministers from Germany, Austria, Poland, Portugal and Spain in a letter urging the Irish EU presidency to adopt a common approach, including a possible windfall tax, according to ANSA. Days earlier, on September 16, Giorgetti said energy price spikes tied to the war in Iran were worsening the situation and that he expected more countries to sign on, ANSA reported.
The idea has already been tried once. In October 2022 the Council of the European Union agreed a bloc-wide windfall profits tax on the fossil fuel sector, billed as a temporary solidarity contribution, according to Tax Foundation Europe. That mechanism ultimately raised more than €26 billion across the bloc, well above the European Commission's initial estimate of €17.5 billion, according to Mondo Expat. EU finance ministers revisited the idea at Eurogroup and Ecofin meetings in Dublin on September 18 and 19 amid continued price volatility, Euronews reported. European Commissioner for Economy Valdis Dombrovskis said several member states have put the proposal forward and that it remains part of the Commission's discussions, while noting that individual countries can already impose such taxes on their own, according to Euronews.
A renewed EU windfall tax would add to pressure on European energy stocks, which are already contending with geopolitical risk and rising bond yields. The consensus Giorgetti describes points to regulatory pressure building rather than easing, even though the timing and scope of any new tax are still unsettled. With no offsetting policy support in view, the balance for the sector tilts toward the downside.