Anticompetitive Object/Effect: An Overview of EU and National Case Law

Abstract

Anticompetitive object is a key notion of EU competition law and is being remolded. This paper presents the trajectory of this process and its impact and demonstrates how this impaired the consistency and predictability of competition analysis. Section 2 gives a concise presentation of an idealized form of the pre-Allianz concept. Section 3 examines the new doctrine’s emergence in Allianz. This is followed by a presentation of its ephemeral marginalization in Cartes bancaires, MasterCard and „Maxima Latvija” (Section 4), where the Court interpreted this doctrine very restrictively and suggested that it may be used on very rare occasions, and its surge in Hoffmann-La Roche & Novartis (Section 5), where the Court failed to resists the siren song of anti-competitive object and showed how the doctrine may erode the pre-existing categories. Section 6 takes stock of the damages caused by the Allianz doctrine to consistency in object-analysis.

Note: “Article published in e-Competitions Bulletin, Special Issue N°91905, www.concurrences.com”

Keywords: anticompetitive object, anticompetitive effect, Article 101 TFEU, competition analysis, per se illegality, rule of reason

JEL Classification: K21