Adapting to the EU Requirements: Recent Evolutions in Romanian Competition and State Aid Law

Posted by D. Daniel Sokol

Oana Stefan (HEC Paris) discusses Adapting to the EU Requirements: Recent Evolutions in Romanian Competition and State Aid Law

ABSTRACT: Since 2007, Romania is, alongside Bulgaria, one of the newest members of the European Union. Consequently, the vast majority of its institutional and legislative developments in competition and State aid are connected to the adaptation of the law to EU requirements. Romanian competition law and policy has been replicating rules, definitions, and concepts established by EU legislation or through EU case law. One example concerns the notion of “undertaking,” broadly defined in the same lines as those developed by the EU Court of Justice. Consequently, commitments from the Romanian Football Federation were approved with regards to retransmission rights for matches, and the National Association of Enforcers of Judicial Decisions was fined for discriminatory practices with regards to the entry in the profession, as well as for fixing excessive prices for their services. Furthermore, according to latest amendments, antitrust legislation applies also to local or central administrative authorities.