On January 12th 2023, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) issued its long-awaited judgment in C‑883/19 P HSBC v Commission setting aside the judgment of the General Court (GC) but confirming the European Commission’s finding that HSBC had participated in a cartel in the market for Euro Interest Rate Derivatives (EIRD). The judgment clarifies the procedural safeguards that…

The long-awaited European Court of Justice’s judgment in Towercast confirmed that national competition authorities (and national courts) can apply abuse of dominance rules to mergers that did not trigger EU and national merger control thresholds and were not referred to the European Commission under Article 22 of the EU Merger Regulation. However, uncertainties still remain….

On 16 January 2023, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (the “COMESA” or the “Common Market”) Competition Appeals Board (the “Appeals Board”) published its seminal decision upholding the commitments provided by the Confédération Africaine de Football (the “CAF”) in relation to contracts for the commercialization of CAF’s media and marketing rights (the “Intermediation…

Advocate General Kokott has found [1] that the General Court erred in law in requiring the European Commission to show anti-competitive effects of a merger with “strong probability” and that the scope of its judicial review was overly broad, notably in relation to economic evidence.   Key takeaways This case will give the Court of…

The following is a selection of some of the most important developments in German competition law and policy in 2021.  It has been a busy year for the Federal Cartel Office (“FCO”), inter alia because the new rules for digital companies took effect.  The following covers cases under these new rules, abuse of dominance, merger…

On 16 May 2018, the General Court annulled the Commission’s decision rejecting Lufthansa’s request for a waiver of commitments it had given when it acquired Swiss in 2005. The Court faulted the Commission for not carrying out a careful examination of Lufthansa’s arguments that significant market changes justified a waiver of the commitments. The Commission…