Posts Companies ArcelorMittal 30 25 June 2026
The country’s parliament has once again voted in favour of this decision; the company supports continued investment in France
In June 2026, the lower house of the French parliament (the National Assembly) voted in favour of the nationalisation of ArcelorMittal’s assets for the second time. The company described this as a ‘wrong decision’ and reaffirmed its development plans for the country.
Second attempt
During the second reading, the bill was supported by all left-wing parties, opposed by right-wing parties and members of Macron’s party, whilst the National Rally (RN) abstained.
As stated in the text of the document, the bill aims to nationalise ArcelorMittal France in order to preserve the country’s industrial sovereignty. An administrative commission is to be set up to determine the price at which the state will acquire the company. However, this amount may not exceed the average actual value of the company’s shares between 1 October 2024 and 30 September 2025.
It is estimated that the nationalisation of ArcelorMittal France will cost €3 billion.
The bill, tabled by the ‘Unbowed France’ (La France Insoumise, LFI) party, had already been approved at first reading in November 2025, but was rejected by the Senate in February 2026 and thus returned to the National Assembly. Following the latest vote, the text is due to be considered again by the upper house of parliament.
Earlier, in October last year, the Senate rejected a bill proposed by the Communists to nationalise Arcelor’s assets.
The bill’s author, Aurélie Trouvé (LFI), noted during the committee’s examination of the bill in early June that ArcelorMittal produces two-thirds of France’s steel, on which a significant part of the country’s industry depends, LCP reported.
“However, its production is under serious threat. We are facing a huge problem of industrial sovereignty,” she noted.
According to her, ArcelorMittal has decided to import all DRI from Brazil, India and the US. Furthermore, the MP expressed concern about job cuts. Ms Trouvé emphasised that the redundancy plan, which will affect 600 employees, is going ahead. This refers to a move announced by the group last spring.
Co-rapporteur Nicolas Sansou (Gauche démocrate et républicaine, GDR) stressed that ArcelorMittal is not keeping its promises, whilst the state and the government are in no way obliging the company to do so.
Opponents of nationalisation regard this move as the wrong response to the real problems — falling European demand for steel, global overcapacity, import pressure and competition from China, and energy prices. As Philippe Juvén, a representative of the right wing of the Republicans, noted in particular, nationalisation would shift the risks from the current owners to the taxpayers.
French assets
ArcelorMittal employs nearly 15,000 people in France, operates around 100 sites across the country – including 40 industrial plants and 5 research centres – and is a major industrial player in the region. The group’s facilities in the country produce various types of flat steel, electrical steel and coated steel.
According to the company, over the past five years it has invested €1.7 billion in its French assets (excluding decarbonisation initiatives).
Specifically, these investments include:
- €500 million — in a new electrical steel production line at the Mardyck site (the first coil produced on this equipment was rolled out in April 2026). The project also received €25 million in state support under the France 2030 programme;
- €300 — for refurbishment work in Dunkirk and Fo;
- €76 million — for the installation of a ladle furnace in Fo-sur-Mer, of which €15 million is support from the French government under France Relance (part of the France 2030 initiative);
- €52 million — for a new vertical continuous casting machine at the ArcelorMittal Industeel plant in Le Creusot (France), of which €12 million was provided under France 2030.
In February 2026, the group confirmed a €1.3 billion investment in Dunkirk for the construction of an electric arc furnace (EAF), which is scheduled to come on stream in 2029.
The plant is expected to produce steel with carbon emissions three times lower than those of a BF-BOF route.
At the same time, at the end of April last year, the company announced plans to cut around 600 jobs at ArcelorMittal France North sites, almost half of which are in Dunkirk.
As stated in the announcement, this figure is not final and is subject to change.
The company stated that these measures are necessary to adapt its operations to the new market context and ensure future competitiveness.
“As the European steel industry faces a crisis characterised by a 20 per cent drop in demand over five years and a sharp rise in imports, which now account for 30 per cent of the market, ArcelorMittal France North must constantly review its efficiency and competitiveness,” ArcelorMittal said at the time.
Flawed logic
In his response in June this year, Alain Le Grix de la Salle, President of ArcelorMittal France, described the debate on the nationalisation of the company’s French assets as deeply biased.
“The narrative is designed to convince people that ArcelorMittal is unwilling to invest in decarbonisation or is in the process of withdrawing from France, and that only nationalisation can save the French steel industry,” he remarked.
De la Salle recalled that, when announcing its investment in Dunkirk, the company explained that the decarbonisation of the facilities would be carried out in stages, based on the model of this asset and future demand for carbon-neutral steel.
“It was also noted that, given the energy crisis and, consequently, the price of gas, the conditions for DRI production do not currently exist in Europe,” said the president of ArcelorMittal France.
Like all European steel producers, he noted, the company is suffering from falling demand and rising competition, particularly from China.
However, “withdrawing from France” is not on the agenda. The import quota system (TRQ) introduced by the EU, together with the CBAM, is opening up new prospects for French and European steel. The real debate today concerns customers and value chains, which are under serious threat of relocation or even disappearance.
Last year, Alain Le Grix de la Salle, in an interview with Franceinfo, had already emphasised that nationalisation would by no means solve the problems facing the company. At the time, he also explained that ArcelorMittal’s French facilities were being affected by global overcapacity and damaging imports, particularly from Asia.
Current cases
ArcelorMittal is scaling back weaker European assets as falling European demand, high energy costs and tougher import competition squeeze margins. For the company closures and sales of assets are portfolio optimization, showing that capital should go to assets with stronger returns and better development prospects.
Recent example is Bosnian operations. In 2025, ArcelorMittal agreed to sell ArcelorMittal Zenica, an integrated steel plant, and ArcelorMittal Prijedor, an iron ore mining business, to Pavgord Group. The company said it made efforts to keep the businesses in the group, but after a strategic review concluded that a sale was the best solution.
ArcelorMittal is also moving ahead with the disposal of its idled Hunedoara plant in Romania, with UMB Steel set to acquire the site’s tangible assets for €12.5 million plus VAT. The transaction follows the September 2025 shutdown of the plant, which ArcelorMittal attributed to prolonged losses, high energy costs and weak regional demand.
The Italian government no longer has additional resources to inject into the troubled steelmaker Acciaierie d’Italia, which was previously part of ArcelorMittal. The government took over management at the start of 2024 after the company slid into a severe liquidity crisis and risked disrupting operations at Italy’s largest steel producer.
In South Africa, the state-owned Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) remains in talks to increase its stake in ArcelorMittal South Africa (AMSA). The negotiations have been ongoing since the fall of 2023. AMSA has currently shut down two steelworks and a mine in the country. The company still operates a plant in Vanderbeilpark, which produces steel sheets and other products, and also has idle capacity in two other cities.
The situation was different in Central Asia. In the fall of 2023, the Kazakh government took back ArcelorMittal’s assets following a series of mining accidents that claimed dozens of lives. At the time, the group stated that negotiations regarding nationalisation had begun even before the October tragedy at the Kostenko Mine, which proved to be the final catalyst for state intervention.
In December 2023, ArcelorMittal finally sold its assets in the country to the state-owned direct investment fund (JSC ‘Qazaqstan Investment Corporation’) for $286 million, although it had sought a significantly higher sum ($3.5 billion). QIC acquired all the shares in ArcelorMittal Temirtau and ArcelorMittal Tubular Products Aktau. Qazaqstan Steel Group became the new investor. ArcelorMittal Temirtau was renamed Qarmet.
At the same time, ArcelorMittal is shifting capital away from mature, politically complex and cost-intensive assets toward India, which has become one of its key growth markets. The country is attracting a larger share of the company’s investment as ArcelorMittal expands capacity where demand prospects are stronger and returns appear more attractive.
At the end of last year, Dilip Oommen, CEO of AMNS India – a joint venture with Japan’s Nippon Steel – announced the company’s intention to reach a steelmaking capacity of 25–26 million tonnes by 2030. Among other things, plans include the construction of a new facility from scratch in the state of Andhra Pradesh. In March this year, the companies broke ground on the project. Upon completion of the first phase, the plant will produce 8.2 million tonnes of steel per year; following the second phase, production will rise to 18 million tonnes.
AMNS India intends to invest between 55,000 and 60,000 crore rupees (approximately $6 to $6.6 billion) in the country over a three-year period — from the 2025/2026 to 2027/2028 financial years.
ArcelorMittal’s Executive Chairman, Lakshmi Mittal, recently stated that India is poised to become the next major driver of global demand for steel.
“The last 20 years have been characterised by China’s incredible growth. Now it is India’s turn, with a large-scale infrastructure expansion, rapid growth in urban housing construction and the energy transition on the horizon,” he noted.
European steelmakers are currently seeing signs of market improvement against the backdrop of the CBAM and EU safeguard measures. At the same time, experts are forecasting a decline in steel production in China. Despite this, it is still too early to speak of a new global market landscape.
However, the desire to nationalise or take control of troubled steel assets in order to preserve their production capacity is not always the answer. As practice shows, such steps can create further problems for national governments, particularly due to the difficulties of reaching settlements with former owners (the British Steel case) and finding new investors (the failed auctions for the sale of Liberty Galați, etc.). Furthermore, governments are forced to incur additional costs to support the operations of such enterprises.
