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Mick Tuesley, Head of the Firm’s National Security Regulatory Practice, and Partner Mark Skerry were quoted in a Foreign Investment Watch article, “UK publishes regime report; France to strengthen FDI oversight,” examining key differences between the UK’s National Security and Investment Act regime and the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), following the release of the UK’s annual report.

Discussing the UK regime’s 1,324 notifications during the reporting period, Mark explained that the higher filing volume compared to CFIUS reflects fundamental differences between the two systems. “The UK’s regime is agnostic to the nationality of the investor and can require a filing even for a domestic U.K. buyer, whereas CFIUS only has jurisdiction over investments by foreign parties,” he said. Mark also noted that the UK regime remains relatively new, “which may result in a number of precautionary filings that increase the overall volume of submissions.”

Addressing the report’s clearance statistics, Mick cautioned against drawing direct comparisons with CFIUS. He explained that the reported U.S. clearance rate reflects transactions approved during the initial review stage and “does not mean that the remaining cases were effectively prohibited.” When transactions cleared after additional review periods are considered, he noted, “the effective clearance rate is much higher.”

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