Katarzyna Śledziewska

In the paper we analyze the Trade and Investment Partnership between the United States and the European Union indicating its specific character. It comes with the parties’ particular characteristics (i.a. one party to a contract, the EU, is a collective entity).Weexamine both parties to the agreement and their position in the international trade in goods and services. The point of reference is global economy and BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China). We also examine the EU and the USA trade relations. The examination covers the years 1995–2012.Weprove that the unification allows both the EU and the USA to take advantage of their significant role in the world trade to increase their impact on the global economic order. EU-US free trade and the agreement conclusion shall allow to intensify trade in services, and FDI flow shall allow to increase the advantage over BRIC countries (primarily China) and to make their economies independent from the instability of the emerging markets.

At the end of 2013, the European Union and China announced the start of negotiations on a bilateral investment agreement. It will be the first agreement signed by the European Union as a partner, and not by its member states. However, almost all of the UE member states have already signed this type of agreements with China. This raises the question of the added value of new contracts entered into by the European Union. Will the new agreement be able to attract new investors? The aim of this study is to demonstrate how the agreements concluded by the EU countries have influenced the volume of stock of foreign direct investment. This paper proposes an analysis of BIT and FTA & EIA agreements and then presents the results of an empirical study based on FDI stocks of the European Union countries.