In Tuesday’s judgment C-253/53 – ASG 2, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) provides some clarification on the compatibility of German rules restricting the fiduciary assignment of cartel damage claims to a provider of legal services with the principle of effectiveness and the right to effective judicial protection in EU law. The ECJ took a…

The term “Assignment Model” refers to a mechanism of bundling damage claims. It is not a statutory instrument, but in some Member States, such as Germany, it is possible as a workaround. The Landgericht Dortmund (Regional Court of Dortmund) decided on referring to the ECJ for a preliminary ruling in the Roundwood Case asking about…

Introduction Last week, Advocate General Maciej Szpunar delivered his Opinion in case C-253/23, a preliminary reference that stems from a form of collective private enforcement of competition law in Germany called the ‘assignment model’. This type of litigation is based on the fiduciary assignment of claims from a high number of persons or companies who…

With the (belated) transposition of the EU Representative Actions Directive (RAD) on 13 October 2023 by means of the RAD Implementing Act (Verbandsklagenrichtlinienumsetzungsgesetz – non-German speakers, I treat you to a beer if you can properly pronounce this Zungenbrecher), the German legislator has ventured new legal territory for collective actions. Now, four main models build the…

The Digital Markets Act has been analysed from a myriad of prisms, both from the public and private enforcement perspectives. However, less attention has been dedicated to analysing the actual content of private enforcement via collective actions, as set out explicitly in Articles 42 and 52 of the DMA. Article 42 DMA establishes that “Directive…

On November 3rd 2023, the University of Vienna, Department of European, International and Comparative Law, together with the European Circle for Competition Damages and the Austrian Society for European Law (ÖGER) hosted a conference on the relevant issue of disclosing evidence in antitrust damages proceedings. Roughly ten years after the European Damages Directive had been…

This is an exciting time to be involved in competition law litigation in the UK. There are numerous claims before the specialist competition court in the UK and, in particular, it is notable that we are witnessing a surge in applications under the new consumer collective opt-out redress provisions introduced by the Consumer Rights Act…

The District Court of Amsterdam indicated in a decision published on 22 August 2023 that it intends to refer preliminary questions to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) on regional jurisdiction (also referred to as ‘territorial’ jurisdiction) in the context of a WAMCA (Act on Damages Claims in a Collective Action) collective action claim brought…

The Regional Court of Dortmund has asked the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) for a preliminary ruling on the access of cartel victims to the so-called ‘assignment model’ (see here). Private enforcement of EU competition law is essentially driven by damage actions that bundle claims assigned by a multitude of victims to…

Introduction With the provisions of the Digital Markets Act (‘DMA’, ‘Regulation’) going into effect as of 2 May 2023, the European Union has introduced its ex-ante instrument to regulate the digital markets. This innovative body of rules targets large digital platforms which provide ‘core platform services’ and qualify as ‘gatekeepers’ (Article 2(1). Such online platforms…