Brexit presser following the meeting between EU’s Barnier and UK Raab 21 August 2018

Barnier

• Need a legally operational backstop
• Negotiations are entering the final stage
• Will negotiate continuously from now on
• After July talks we are far more advanced in defining common ground for security than for trade

UK’s Raab

• We’ve had a positive set of discussions
• Still significant issues to overcome
• We’ve agreed to step up the energy of discussions
• UK has shown energy and ambition and pragmatism to reach a deal
• Is confident of reaching an agreement in October

A couple of questions were taken.

Barnier;

• We can still find common ground in talks
• A Brexit deal is needed not much later than Nov
• EU is not working towards a no-deal Brexit

Raab

• We need to accentuate the positive (top spinning Raab)
• Our actions speak louder than words

Well, that was about as enlightening as a broken light bulb. What did we learn? Nothing. What might we learn in the future? Nothing. I’m going back to looking for kitchen taps online. GBPUSD did nothing around 1.2850/60, EURGBP did naff all around 0.8970.

Update: Just thinking things through a bit further and if there’s one morsel I took from the Raab/Barnier meeting, it’s that Raab definitely looked for Barnier to lead in the answers. Might just be British politeness or it might be a weakness. Need to watch that more carefully. Davis and Barnier were old mates so there was a lot of mutual respect there. The dynamics in this seemed different.

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Ryan Littlestone

Psychedelic chartist extraordinaire. Have your shades ready.
Philosophy: “Don’t be a Dick for a tick”

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