A communication in the next symposium of the German Association of Law and Economics (Gesellschaft für Recht und
Ökonomik e.V.) at Bolsano (Trentino- Alto Adige / Südtirol) on the as-efficient competitor test in the implementation of Article 102 TFEU.
The Post Danmark judgment may cast the light on the interpretations
by the EU Court of Justice of crucial dimensions of the competition policy as:
selective price cuts, above-cost rebates, costs test for exclusionary abuses
with common costs. As we see one of the main interests of the decision lies on
the cost criteria used by the Court to determine if a given price practice may
exclude a competitor as efficient as the incumbent.
In other words, is the Post Danmark judgement a real
step towards the appropriation by the Court of Justice of the more economic
approach promoted by the Commission and, more broadly, is really the logic of
the Court coherent with an effects-based approach? Does Post Danmark
conciliates the traditional decisional practice of the Court with the new
principles of competition policy enforcement advocated by the Commission since
the issuance of its February 2009 guidelines, relative to the exclusionary
practices of dominant undertakings?
