EU FDI Screening From 17 January 2028: The In-Depth Review Risk in Numbers
European Commission figures show the share of notified foreign direct investments that move beyond the 15-calendar-day majority track into in-depth security review.
AI Summary
The Commission reports 667 foreign direct investment notifications, a 40% increase from 477. Most cases—88%—closed within 15 calendar days, while 12% required an in-depth security risk assessment. Manufacturing accounted for 53% of those deeper cases, and Commission opinions appeared in less than 2% overall. Investors and importers should plan for roughly a one-in-eight deeper-review risk before the EU FDI screening rules apply on 17 January 2028.
What happened
The European Commission’s Directorate-General for Trade and Economic Security published figures showing how foreign direct investment notifications moved through the EU cooperation mechanism. The mechanism received 667 notifications, compared with 477 in the earlier reported period.
Most notified cases did not enter a deeper procedure: 88% closed within 15 calendar days. The minority that did require more scrutiny is the important planning group: 12% of notified investments required an in-depth security risk assessment.
“in-depth security risk assessment” — European Commission, Directorate-General for Trade and Economic Security: the reported category covering 12% of notified investments.
Within that deeper-review group, manufacturing accounted for 53% of cases. The Commission issued opinions in less than 2% of cases overall.
Why now
The EU FDI screening rules apply from 17 January 2028. That date gives businesses a fixed compliance deadline, but the caseload is already growing.
Notifications increased by 40%, rising from 477 to 667. The difference is 190 additional notifications. Relative to 477, that increase is approximately 39.8%, which the Commission reports as 40%.
A company preparing for 17 January 2028 should therefore not treat screening as a low-volume formality. The mechanism has already been handling a larger workload, and the published outcomes show that a measurable minority of notifications moves beyond the 15-calendar-day track.
So what
The reported figures separate three outcomes that are easy to conflate:
- Fast closure: 88% of notified cases closed within 15 calendar days.
- Deeper assessment: 12% of notified investments required an in-depth security risk assessment.
- Commission opinion: opinions were issued in less than 2% of cases.
Applied to 667 notifications, 88% is approximately 587 cases. The remaining 12% is approximately 80 investments. That means deeper review was substantially more common than a Commission opinion.
Manufacturing investors face the most concentrated exposure. Manufacturing represented 53% of in-depth assessment cases, equal to roughly 42 cases when applied to the approximate 80-investment deeper-review group. The figures do not say that every manufacturing filing is reviewed deeply; they show that manufacturing dominates the group that is.
How confident
已确认. The reported totals and percentages are 667 notifications, 477 earlier notifications, a 40% increase, 88% closure within 15 calendar days, a 12% in-depth assessment rate, a 53% manufacturing share within that group, and opinions in less than 2% of cases.
推断. The approximate counts of 587 fast closures, 80 in-depth assessments, and 42 manufacturing assessments are arithmetic from the reported total and percentages. They are planning estimates rather than separately published exact counts.
什么情况下我会错. Updated Commission statistics showing different notification totals or outcome shares would change the probabilities. An official source providing filing fees, delay costs, transaction-value thresholds, or average in-depth-review duration would also permit a monetary or timeline calculation that the current figures do not support.
The source material does not provide a filing fee, legal-cost estimate, daily delay cost, transaction-value threshold, or average duration for an in-depth assessment. Consequently, no euro-denominated cost can be calculated without inventing a rate or amount. The supported conclusion is about review probability, sector concentration, and the 15-calendar-day majority track.
Work it out: the landed cost calculator
Different question, same method: the step-by-step guides
For you
- Manufacturing investors and owners of EU production assets: identify whether your transaction falls within the most heavily represented in-depth-review sector and prepare supporting security and supply-chain information early.
- Importers linked to foreign-owned suppliers or EU distribution assets: map ownership, control, technology access, and critical-input dependencies before a notification deadline forces the analysis.
- Deal teams and compliance counsel: schedule around a possible in-depth assessment rather than assuming every filing will close within 15 calendar days.
- Portfolio companies with multiple EU transactions: apply the 12% rate to your expected notification count and reserve management capacity for roughly one deeper case in every eight.
The data point
| Figure | What it means |
|---|---|
| 667 notifications | Notified foreign direct investments in the reported period |
| 477 notifications | Earlier comparison volume |
| 40% increase | Growth in notifications to the EU cooperation mechanism |
| 88% | Share of notified cases closed within 15 calendar days |
| 15 calendar days | Period within which most cases closed |
| 12% | Share requiring an in-depth security risk assessment |
| 53% | Manufacturing share of in-depth assessment cases |
| Less than 2% | Share of cases in which the Commission issued opinions |
FAQ
Will every notification close within 15 calendar days?
No. The Commission reports that 88% of notified cases closed within 15 calendar days, which is a strong majority but not a guarantee. On the reported total of 667 notifications, that equals roughly 587 cases. The other 12% did not follow that fast-track outcome. A transaction timetable that assumes closure in 15 calendar days for every filing ignores the reported minority and leaves no room for additional information requests or security analysis.
How likely is an in-depth security risk assessment?
The reported rate is 12% of notified investments. Applied to 667 notifications, that is approximately 80 cases. In plain planning terms, a business should treat deeper review as roughly a one-in-eight possibility for each notified investment. The actual result for an individual transaction will be binary—either it enters the assessment or it does not—but the 12% rate is the best portfolio-level expectation supported by the published figures.
Why does manufacturing matter?
Manufacturing matters because it accounts for 53% of in-depth assessment cases, more than half of the deeper-review group. Using the approximate total of 80 deeper cases, 53% corresponds to roughly 42 manufacturing cases. A manufacturing investor should not assume review is automatic, but it should expect greater scrutiny concentration than businesses in sectors that make up smaller shares of the in-depth caseload. Ownership, technology, inputs, and EU production footprint should be documented early.
Does a low opinion rate mean low compliance risk?
No. The Commission issued opinions in less than 2% of cases, but 12% required an in-depth security risk assessment. Those are different outcomes. A transaction can incur delay, management attention, document production, and uncertainty without becoming one of the fewer-than-2% of cases in which an opinion is issued. The official figures do not provide a monetary cost, but they do show that deeper scrutiny is several times more common than an opinion.
How we calculated this
additional notifications = current notifications - earlier notifications
190 notifications = 667 notifications - 477 notifications
growth rate = additional notifications / earlier notifications
40 percent ≈ 190 notifications / 477 notifications
fast closures = total notifications × fast-closure share
587 cases ≈ 667 notifications × 88 percent
in-depth assessments = total notifications × in-depth share
80 cases ≈ 667 notifications × 12 percent
manufacturing in-depth cases = in-depth assessments × manufacturing share
42 cases ≈ 80 cases × 53 percent
opinion-case ceiling = total notifications × 2 percent
fewer than 14 cases < 667 notifications × 2 percentThe point
Before the rules apply on 17 January 2028, the numbers point to a clear planning rule: expect most EU FDI notifications to close within 15 calendar days, but reserve time and resources for the 12% that enter in-depth review. Manufacturing transactions deserve particular attention because they represent 53% of that higher-risk group.
The notification volumes behind this forecast are in 2025 EU FDI screening notification volumes and 15-day closure rates and in the 40 percent jump in notifications.
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How this was made
Research and drafting are tool-assisted. Every figure is traced to a named primary source and checked against it, each article clears a structural review and an information-gain review before publication, and corrections are recorded in a dated note above. The review process is described on the about page.