Finance officials from the Group of Seven rich democracies will weigh risks from new digital currencies and debate how to tax tech companies like Google and Amazon when they meet at a chateau north of Paris starting Wednesday. The G-7 countries are Europe's Germany, France, Britain and Italy, plus Canada, Japan and the United States. U.S. officials have said they're investigating the French move as a possible unfair trade practice that could lead to retaliation. Le Maire, in turn, said the French tax was intended to spur international action: "As soon as there will be an international solution, we will withdraw the national taxation." Where the U.S. may find more common ground with its G-7 partners will be in its mistrust of cryptocurrencies like Facebook's recently announced Libra.

Source: ABC News July 16, 2019 15:52 UTC