EU Publishes Report On Damages Directive

The European Commission has published a report on the implementation of the Antitrust Damages Directive which helps citizens and companies claim damages if they are victims of infringements of EU antitrust rules, such as cartels or abuses of dominant market positions. Based on the findings of the report, the Commission has drawn positive conclusions as regards the consistent implementation of its rules. In line with the requirements in the Directive, the report has been sent to the European Parliament and the Council.

The 2014 Antitrust Damages Directive pursues two complementary goals. First, it removes practical obstacles to compensation for all victims of infringements of EU antitrust law. Second, the Directive fine-tunes the interplay between private damages actions and public enforcement of the EU antitrust rules by the Commission and national competition authorities.

By 2018, all Member States implemented the Directive. The Commission assessed whether the national implementing rules are conform with the Directive. This assessment has not revealed any systemic issues.

The report takes stock of the implementation of the rules concerning some of the core rules of the Directive, such as the right to full compensation, disclosure of evidence, evidentiary value of infringement decisions, limitation periods, passing on of overcharges, and estimation of harm.

The report is available online.

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