This paper brings up to date an on-going statistical analysis of the fines imposed in cartel prosecutions commenced between 1998 and 2006 by the European Commission and courts on appeal under the 1998 Penalty Guidelines and completed to the end of October 2010. Based on an analysis of all 46...

The English courts in Sainsbury's v. MasterCard and Morrisons v. MasterCard came to opposite conclusions on the illegality of MasterCard's multilateral interchange fees (MIFs). While both courts posited bilateral counterfactuals, the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) in Sainsbury's held that...

Sainsbury's v. MasterCard establishes the pass-on “defence” in English/UK law. The Competition Appeal Tribunal set out a two-part test which it erroneously distinguished from the economists' notion of pass-on. It then went on the develop key elements of legal test for pass-on in price fixing...

This paper questions whether markets need contain products that are direct substitutes for consumers. It shows that there are many instances where markets consist of products that are not direct substitutes, and those which consumers cannot directly use or are at different functional levels in...

The UK Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has been a highly rated competition law enforcer. Yet its antitrust performance activities fall far short of this image. Here a critical assessment is made of the OFT's antitrust enforcement activities, and the claim that there is quantitative survey evidence...

The standard of proof required in merger cases has become the centre of considerable controversies and confusion following the Australian Federal Court's decision in Metcash. This paper reviews the use of counterfactuals and the inherent contradictions in adopting the real chance standard of...

These two papers look at recent decisions and controversies surrounding the counterfactual test under s 36 of the New Zealand Commerce Act 1986, and s46 of the Australian Competition and Consumer Act 2010 respectively. In 2010 the New Zealand Supreme Court in 0867 affirmed the counterfactual as...

Based on an analysis of cartel prosecutions since 2007, this article assesses the way the European Commission has built up its fines in practice. The fines are compared with those imposed by the European Commission over the period from 1999 to 2006. The main findings are that, while fines have...

This paper sets out the basic economics of cartel formation and stability, the methods of estimating overcharges and quot;but forquot; prices, and concludes with a brief discussion of multiple damages. It draws on some evidence of cartel prosecution in Europe