Recidivism has in the last few years attracted much attention and controversy in the context of EU antitrust enforcement. The treatment of recidivism by the European Commission and the EU Courts has often been criticized, and the observed incidence of recidivism has led to some questioning of...

This paper discusses discretion and prioritisation in public antitrust enforcement, in particular in the enforcement of EU antitrust law. First, the paper defines the notion of discretion and discusses the rationale of discretion. Second, it examines the enforcement of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU...

On 1 September 2006, the European Commission published new Guidelines on the method it will use when setting fines for undertakings that have infringed the competition rules laid down in Articles 81 and 82 of the EC Treaty. This paper discusses the questions what the purpose is of guidelines,...

The EC antitrust prohibitions are regularly invoked in private litigation as a shield. Private parties also play an important role in public antitrust enforcement through complaints to the competition authorities. However, in marked contrast with the situation in the US, private actions for...

This paper deals with the application of the principle of 'ne bis in idem' in EC antitrust enforcement. The principle of 'ne bis in idem', laid down in Article 4 of Protocol 7 to the European Convention on Human Rights and in Article 50 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union,...

Competition authorities need to obtain intelligence and evidence of antitrust violations so as to be able to punish the antitrust violators and create deterrence. The best information will usually be in the hands of the antitrust violators themselves. The first part of this article gives an...

This paper concerns the relationship between public antitrust enforcement and private actions for damages, focusing in particular on the enforcement of Articles 81 and 82 EC. In the first half of the paper, I examine the respective roles of public antitrust enforcement and private actions for...

Should companies that have antitrust compliance programmes be granted a reduction in the amount of fines or even immunity from fines when they are found to have committed antitrust infringements? Should the absence of a compliance programme constitute an aggravating factor leading to higher...

Article 3 of Regulation 1/2003 obliges the competition authorities of the EU Member States (national competition authorities or NCAs) to apply Articles 101 and 102 TFEU (EU antitrust law) whenever they apply national competition law to conduct falling within the scope of EU antitrust law....