November 25th EU Brexit Summit: What to expect? – Barclays

The Barclays Research Team offer their expectations on Sunday’s (Nov 25th) highly anticipated EU Brexit Summit.

Key Quotes:

“Summit … will formally kick off the process of the ratification of the Withdrawal Agreement necessary to formalize the withdrawal agreement. 

Before this can happen some blanks in the draft withdrawal agreement need to be filled in, and the political declaration regarding the long-term economic relationship needs to be finalized completely. 

We would make the following points:

Little wiggle room, if any: as highlighted previously, even though some member states have already voiced concerns and despite some opposition on the UK side, there is fundamentally very little room to renegotiate the agreement itself. This goes both ways and counts for the UK as well as for EU member states. 

Non-binding political declaration to capture loose ends: the consequence of the previous point is that the political declaration regarding the long-term economic relationship might end up including some wording designed to soothe the concerns of individual countries. Accordingly, it might end up being less straightforward than initially thought  … but regardless, it is unlikely to become legally binding. 

Overall, and reflecting the concerns by some EU member states as well as the particular situation here in the UK, Sunday's EU council will likely be tense, possibly lasting for a couple of hours, but ultimately we believe it is likely to deliver a finalized and official version of the Withdrawal Agreement with only marginal amendments from the current version.”