Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2667 actions· ✨ 89 recent

President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. signed Executive Order No. 113 on April 13, 2026, promulgating the 13th Regular Foreign Investment Negative List (FINL) — the first FINL update in four years, superseding the 12th FINL under EO 175 (2022). The order retains the constitutionally mandated 40% foreign equity ceiling on exploration, development, and utilisation of natural resources (including large-scale mining), and reserves small-scale mining 100% for Filipino nationals. It codifies liberalisations from RA 11659 (Public Service Act), RA 11595 (Retail Trade Liberalisation Act), and RA 11647 (Foreign Investments Act amendments), formally reclassifying telecommunications, airlines, domestic shipping, and railways as sectors open to up to 100% foreign ownership.

Mongolia's State Great Khural adopted Resolution No. 62 on 2 July 2025, establishing a Temporary Oversight Committee chaired by MP O. Batnairamdal to investigate the state's ownership interest and percentage in the Oyu Tolgoi Strategic Group of Deposits, including the valuation of JV License areas (Shivee Tolgoi and Javkhlant) held by Entrée LLC for the Entrée/OTLLC joint venture. The Committee conducted three-day public hearings in early December 2025, summoning approximately 300 witnesses including former Mongolian Prime Ministers and Presidents, and Rio Tinto CEO Stephen Scott. On 19 December 2025, the Committee submitted a draft resolution to Parliament, which was referred to the Standing Committee on Economics for further consideration ahead of government negotiations. The investigation creates material uncertainty for Rio Tinto's Oyu Tolgoi underground ramp-up (~480 kt/y Cu at peak) and Entrée Resources' JV License renewal, with the 2009 Investment Agreement potentially subject to renegotiation.

On 27 February 2025, the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova adopted Law No. 33/2025 amending Law No. 174/2021 on the mechanism for examining investments of importance for state security. The law entered into force on 20 April 2025 after publication in Monitorul Oficial Nr. 144-147 of 20 March 2025 (promulgated by Presidential Decree No. 118-X of 17 March 2025). Key operative changes expand the protected-sector perimeter to explicitly enumerate 17 categories covering data processing and storage, AI, robotics, cybersecurity, semiconductors, quantum, nanotechnology and biotechnology alongside the pre-existing energy, transport, communications, defence and aerospace pillars; add new grounds for refusal (money-laundering suspicion, corruption convictions, foreign-government control, cybersecurity risk, access to personal data of citizens); introduce enhanced Council powers including retroactive review of previously approved investments and fines of up to 5% of annual turnover (capped at MDL 5 million); and carve out intra-group transactions, asset sales below EUR 1 million, and state-owned-enterprise dealings. The Screening Council became operational in July 2025.

Decreto Supremo N° 020-2024-EM, published in El Peruano on 29 October 2024, declares private investment in mining activity to be of "public necessity" (necesidad pública) under Article 71 of the Peruvian Constitution, authorising GLOBETROTTERS RESOURCES PERU S.A.C. — a foreign-invested mining company — to acquire and hold mining concessions within Peru's constitutionally-restricted fifty-kilometre border zone. The decree sets procedural precedent for Article 71 case-by-case FDI carve-outs in large-scale mining and signals MINEM's operational posture on foreign-investor access to border-proximate mineral projects in the 2024-2026 Peruvian copper, silver, and zinc capex cycle.

On 4 July 2024 the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry (François-Philippe Champagne) issued a ministerial statement on Investment Canada Act net-benefit reviews of Canadian critical-minerals companies. Acquisitions of control of important Canadian mining companies engaged in significant critical-minerals operations, including large Canadian-headquartered firms, will be found of net benefit only "in the most exceptional of circumstances." The statement extends the October 2022 state-owned-enterprise policy to foreign capital generally for this class of target. It states no size threshold and no effective date beyond the announcement.

On 28 October 2022, Canada's Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry (François-Philippe Champagne) and Minister of Natural Resources (Jonathan Wilkinson) issued a new policy on how the Investment Canada Act applies to investments by foreign state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in Canada's critical minerals sector. Acquisitions of control of a Canadian critical-minerals business by a foreign SOE will now only be approved "on an exceptional basis," and any SOE participation in a Canadian business operating in a critical-minerals sector or supply chain will automatically trigger national-security scrutiny. The policy applies to the 31 minerals on Canada's Critical Minerals List (established 11 March 2021) and preceded, by five days, the 2 November 2022 orders forcing three Chinese-controlled companies to divest lithium-junior stakes.

On 24 March 2021, Canada's Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry (François-Philippe Champagne) issued updated guidelines on the National Security Review of Investments under the Investment Canada Act. The revised guidelines (superseding 2016 guidance) identify four areas of heightened national-security concern in foreign direct investment review: sensitive personal data, sensitive technology, critical minerals, and investments by state-owned or state-influenced investors. The critical- minerals designation references the 31-mineral Critical Minerals List Canada had announced two weeks earlier (11 March 2021).