Le Conseil de la concurrence s'est à nouveau saisi de sa propre inititiave pour rendre le 16 février 2016 un avis sur un projet de loi, cette fois-ci sur le projet de loi n°6864 portant sur le bail commercial.
Suite à la libéralisation des prix des leçons de conduite des auto-écoles en juillet 2011 et dans le cadre de sa mission légale (article 33 de la Loi du 23 octobre 2011 relative à la concurrence), le Conseil de la concurrence avait ouvert une enquête sectorielle dans le secteur des auto-écoles au Grand-Duché de Luxembourg.
Following complaints by the Luxembourg retail sector and the attention by the European Commission on possible restrictions on the internal market in the retail sector, the Luxembourg Competition Council opened in an inquiry into the distribution networks in the retail market of Luxembourg at the end of 2014. The Competition Council will more particularly assess whether the obligation for Luxembourg retailers to source most fast moving consumer goods from Belgian wholesalers and suppliers is legal from a competition law perspective. The inquiry results, which are expected by the end of 2015, may lead to ex officio actions against any anticompetitive behaviour of suppliers that would be identified.
The directive 2014/104/UE on certain rules governing actions for damages under national law for infringements of the competition law provisions of the Member States and of the European Union was adopted on 26 November 2014 and published on 5 December 2014. This directive seeks to promote and address obstacles to successful antitrust damages claims before national courts. Member States have two years to implement it into national law.
On 30 September 2014, the European Commission (the "EC") published the non-confidential version of a decision taken on 11 June 2014 launching a formal in-depth investigation in relation to transfer pricing arrangements on corporate income taxation ("CIT") of Fiat Finance and Trade ("FFT") in Luxembourg.
On 30 September 2014, the German Bundeskartellamt published a revised guidance paper on "Domestic Effects in Merger Control". The guidance paper aims to provide more legal certainty for concentrations between companies based outside Germany, which often raise the question as to whether German notification thresholds are triggered. The paper provides an analytical framework to assess scenarios in which domestic effects can either be clearly identified or ruled out and identifies essential criteria for the necessary case-by-case assessment of domestic effects in other cases.
On 10 October 2014, the General Court ("GC") struck down the Commission decision against Soliver NV (Case T-68/09) given that it had failed to establish that Soliver had participated in a single and continuous infringement of Article 101 TFEU in the automotive glass sector. The GC therefore annulled the EUR 4,396,000 fine imposed on Soliver.
On 9 October 2014, the Court of Justice dismissed the appeal lodged by Industries Chimiques du Fluor ("ICF") against the judgment of 18 June 2013, in which the General Court ("GC") rejected its application for annulment of the Commission's decision concerning a worldwide price-fixing and market-sharing cartel on the aluminum fluoride market. Two legal points merit attention.
On 7 October 2014, the General Court ("GC") handed down a judgment in the hotly debated area of access to the file. Damage claimants are frequently seeking access to information contained in the Commission's file in order to substantiate their claims for damages. In this case, DB Schenker had requested the Commission access to the entire case file in the air cargo investigation, to the confidential version of the Decision or to the non-confidential version of the Decision on the basis of the Transparency Regulation (Regulation 1049/2002). After the Commission denied the requests, DB Schenker appealed to the GC. Seven air cargo carriers joined the proceedings as interveners on the Commission's side.
The EU state aid rules are directed to Member States. In situations where public undertakings take measures which can be seen as conferring an advantage on another undertaking, the question can arise whether that measure should in fact be imputed to the Member State which owns the public undertaking. Against this background the Court of Justice has developed jurisprudence as to the imputability to the State of measures taken by undertakings.
