President Joe Biden is expected to block a $15 billion deal by Japan’s Nippon Steel to buy US Steel, ending months of frantic lobbying and delivering a setback to Washington’s relationship with its closest Asia-Pacific ally. In one of his final actions in government, Biden — long opposed to the takeover — is expected to announce as soon as Friday his decision to kill the proposed acquisition of the iconic US steelmaker, according to two people familiar with the matter.
One of those people said the White House had yet to notify Nippon Steel about the decision. The president’s expected move comes after an inter-agency investment screening review, known as the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US, failed to reach consensus by a December 23 deadline on whether the acquisition posed a national security threat. Two people close to the situation said Nippon Steel was likely to take legal action against the outgoing president’s ruling. One person said such an action could, during the discovery process, reveal the extent to which the decision had been led by politics rather than national security concerns. The process would also expose the limitations of the Cfius process and its vulnerability to political interests. Shares in US Steel fell 8 percent in pre-market trading on Friday. Nippon Steel declined to comment. President-elect Donald Trump had also threatened to quash the deal and vowed to protect the Pittsburgh-based company through a mix of tariffs and tax incentives. The year-long saga’s conclusion marks the failure of an audacious gambit by the Japanese group that soon morphed into a sensitive political issue in an election year. It also represents a significant departure from the US’s long-standing open investment environmen
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