In a judgment dated Wednesday 7 March (case C-127/16 P), the Court of Justice of the EU has upheld a judgment of the General Court of the EU of December 2015, whereby more than €642 million in unlawful state aid must be paid back by the company Financière Sernam and its subsidiaries.
Sernam is a former SNCF subsidiary, specialised in transport and logistics. It was privatised in 2005 and, in January 2012, some of its assets were taken over by Geodis, which is affiliated to SNCF Logistics, itself a branch of SNCF Group.
In December 2015, the General Court of the EU confirmed that a total of more than €642 million not including interest was repayable by Financière Sernam and its subsidiaries (case T-242/12) (see EUROPE 11456). SNCF appealed to the Court of Justice for this judgment to be overturned.
Adopting the reasoning of the Advocate General (see EUROPE 11834), the European Court considers that: - the transfer of Sernam to Financière Sernam included almost all of Sernam's liabilities, which should have excluded; - the purpose of selling all of Sernam's assets en masse, which aimed to interrupt its economic activity, was not complied with; - that there was economic continuity between Sernam and Financière Sernam through Sernam Xpress, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sernam; - the test of a private investor in a situation of a sale at a negative price was not applicable. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)