Picture a world where Europe’s most innovative companies cannot access the raw materials they need for the Green Transition, where Latin America’s economies remain trapped in commodity dependence, and where both regions watch helplessly as other powers write the rules of 21st-century global economy. This is the trajectory both regions are on if they continue their current path of missed opportunities. For its part, the countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates) are currently watching EU-Latin America relations and learning important lessons from it.
While Europe perfects the art of committee deliberation and Latin America struggles with its everlasting political divisions, more decisive powers are reshaping global economic architecture without asking permission. The BRICS+ now control 30% of global GDP and dominate critical mineral markets, positioning themselves as genuine competitors to Western economic influence. Meanwhile, Europe’s share of global economic output continues its relentless decline from 25% three decades ago toward a projected 11% by 2045.
Yet, this situation is not inevitable. What if Europe’s greatest need (re: for strategic autonomy) could become Latin America’s greatest opportunity? What if Latin America’s abundant resources and growing markets could provide Europe with exactly the partnership it needs to escape dependency on unpredictable superpowers? The potential is staggering: €500 billion in untapped trade opportunities, 650 million consumers hungry for European technology and services, and the chance to create supply chains that no single power can disrupt. The question isn’t whether Europe and Latin America need each other, as the mathematics of mutual benefit are overwhelming. The question is whether both regions can move fast enough to seize this historic opportunity.
The Latin American Option: Filling the Vacuum
As a result of today’s geopolitical context, Latin America has become a priority for not only Europe but also China and the United States, which is looking to reinforce the Monroe Doctrine in the region. Latin America represents new consumers, abundant natural resources, and economies that share Europe’s democratic values and development aspirations. More importantly, Latin America offers Europe what no other partnership can: tangible improvements in terms of strategic autonomy.
Imagine this transformation in action: Volkswagen’s partnership with Brazilian lithium producer Sigma Lithium creates an efficient electric vehicle supply chain that bypasses Chinese control entirely. Iberdrola’s collaboration with Chilean solar innovators combines European engineering with the Atacama Desert’s unmatched solar resources—generating electricity at costs that make European energy look expensive by comparison. Santander’s digital banking expansion across Latin America demonstrates how European financial expertise can create inclusion while generating returns that make venture capitalists take notice.
To be more precise, European capital and Latin-American projects are complementary in both scale and sectoral structure. Euro-area pension funds alone manage about €3.5 trillion, and the wider European market tops €4.5 trillion; yet after a decade of negative real rates the average defined-benefit portfolio still earns barely 3% in fixed income. By redirecting even a fraction of pension allocations into Latin-American public–private partnerships, Europe could lock in dollar yields of 8–12% now available on investment-grade infrastructure debt and concessions for ports, clean-energy corridors and 5G backbones, while ensuring its own engineering supply chains have the roads, bulk terminals and power they need to extract and ship critical minerals.
A parallel arbitrage exists in financial services. Europe’s. Latin America hosts roughly 400 million adults who are still unbanked or under-banked. This is about 70% of the population, despite the fact that smartphone penetration tops 80%. This demand shock has driven payments and neobank revenues to grow significantly in the past years, as 57% of fintech companies in the region are targeting underbanked or unbanked populations, but the region’s venture capital pool is barely 3% of Europe’s. For this reason, it is essential to lower the barriers for European funds to access the Latin American markets, from excessive financial compliance requirements to complexities associated with cross-border capital flows.
Building Prosperity, Not Dependency
Modern trade partnerships must create shared wealth, not dependency relationships, and this is where both Europe and Latin America have a lot to offer each other. Unlike China’s economic foreign policy, Europe provides its partners with genuine technological transfer and shared ownership rather than dependency relationships. Chinese investment often comes with Chinese workers, Chinese suppliers, and Chinese control. Europe’s advantage lies in its ability to offer true collaboration – partnerships where Latin American countries become co-creators rather than mere suppliers.
For the European Union, as mentioned, a strategic partnership with Latin America enhances the Union’s open strategic autonomy by diversifying economic dependencies and reducing exposure to unilateral measures from third countries. This comprehensive partnership framework would unlock significant economic potential, including €500 billion in untapped bilateral trade opportunities and €2 trillion in combined market capitalization, while strengthening supply chain resilience through geographic diversification that mitigates single-source dependencies and enhances the EU’s strategic autonomy in critical value chains.
Europe should be under no illusion that it has unlimited time. The United States has begun to reassert its strategic primacy in the Western Hemisphere, with President Trump openly reviving a modern interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine. Washington is signaling that Latin America is once again a core geopolitical priority, not a peripheral theater. This renewed U.S. focus will bring capital, security guarantees, and political attention back into the region, but it will also crowd out passive actors. For Europe, this is not a threat but a warning. If the EU remains slow, fragmented, and overly procedural, Latin America’s next phase of integration will be shaped primarily by U.S. strategic interests, with Europe relegated to a secondary role.
Acting decisively now is the only way for Europe to remain competitive in an increasingly challenging geopolitical and economic context.