What You Need to Know About Tesla's EU-wide Approval Process
Tesla recently received a major boost with the news that Denmark and Belgium have approved its full self-driving (supervised ) (FSD). This adds a combined 3.9% of the EU’s population to the mix, bringing the total to 5% (Netherlands, Lithuania, and Estonia) already in the bag, for a total of 8.9%, or about 40 million people.
Notable points for Tesla investors need to be considered
First, once again, the two new countries took the Article 39 route under EU Regulation 2018/858 to grant approval in their territories. I’ve explained this previously; suffice it to note here that these smaller companies are happy to approve FSD before waiting for an EU-wide approval vote.
I don’t wish to enter the realms of political discussion here. Still, it’s interesting that the smaller countries, which have far less sway in voting for EU-wide approval, are electing to go ahead and approve FSD, while the larger countries (which really drive qualified majority voting, or QMV, at the EU level) are not. Is this a consequence of wanting to make it all about QMV, and not about subsidiarity? Answers on a postcard, please.
An EU-wide vote on Tesla FSD
Second, as a reminder, the EU-wide vote on FSD requires a 55% threshold among EU member states (at least 15), and the voting countries should represent 65% of the EU’s population. As things stand, five have approved FSD, representing 8.9% of the EU population. Looked at another way, if more than 35% of the EU population, based on country votes, vote against EU-wide approval, then it won’t happen.
Here are the top five by population share:
- Germany 19%
- France 15%
- Italy 13%
- Spain 11%
- Poland 8%
Clearly, if Germany and France vote “nein” and “non”, then it’s extremely difficult to see how the EU-wide vote will be positive. Looking across various scenarios, if only France says “non” among the top five, then adding the other four to the assumed 8.9% above gets to nearly 60%, and, provided the 15 countries’ proviso is met, FSD will almost certainly be approved. A similar calculation for only a “nein” yields almost 56% and a similar outcome.
In other words, Germany and France together are likely to result in a “no” vote, but one of them alone is not necessarily the case. Clearly, Italy and Spain matter a lot, too, because they will play a major role in the swing that’s needed to get an EU-wide “yes”.
Tesla recently received a major boost with the news that Denmark and Belgium have approved its full self-driving (supervised ) (FSD). This adds a combined 3.9% of the EU’s population to the mix, bringing the total to 5% (Netherlands, Lithuania, and Estonia) already in the bag, for a total of 8.9%, or about 40 million people.
Notable points for Tesla investors need to be considered
First, once again, the two new countries took the Article 39 route under EU Regulation 2018/858 to grant approval in their territories. I’ve explained this previously; suffice it to note here that these smaller companies are happy to approve FSD before waiting for an EU-wide approval vote.
I don’t wish to enter the realms of political discussion here. Still, it’s interesting that the smaller countries, which have far less sway in voting for EU-wide approval, are electing to go ahead and approve FSD, while the larger countries (which really drive qualified majority voting, or QMV, at the EU level) are not. Is this a consequence of wanting to make it all about QMV, and not about subsidiarity? Answers on a postcard, please.
An EU-wide vote on Tesla FSD
Second, as a reminder, the EU-wide vote on FSD requires a 55% threshold among EU member states (at least 15), and the voting countries should represent 65% of the EU’s population. As things stand, five have approved FSD, representing 8.9% of the EU population. Looked at another way, if more than 35% of the EU population, based on country votes, vote against EU-wide approval, then it won’t happen.
Here are the top five by population share:
- Germany 19%
- France 15%
- Italy 13%
- Spain 11%
- Poland 8%
Clearly, if Germany and France vote “nein” and “non”, then it’s extremely difficult to see how the EU-wide vote will be positive. Looking across various scenarios, if only France says “non” among the top five, then adding the other four to the assumed 8.9% above gets to nearly 60%, and, provided the 15 countries’ proviso is met, FSD will almost certainly be approved. A similar calculation for only a “nein” yields almost 56% and a similar outcome.
In other words, Germany and France together are likely to result in a “no” vote, but one of them alone is not necessarily the case. Clearly, Italy and Spain matter a lot, too, because they will play a major role in the swing that’s needed to get an EU-wide “yes”.
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