On Thursday 23 May, European Commissioner for Competition, Margrethe Vestager, announced that the European Commission had imposed a fine of €337.5 million on Mondelēz International, Inc. (United States) for infringing European competition rules in a number of ways and hindering trade in chocolate, biscuit and coffee products between Member States.
The investigation and the allegations. The Commissioner hopes that this decision will serve as a signal to the entire food retail sector. She has placed particular emphasis on price rises in this sector and praised the efforts of national competition authorities to counter illegal practices.
The European Commission had carried out unannounced inspections at the premises of Mondelēz in Austria, Belgium and Germany, in November 2019, and then opened formal proceedings in January 2021.
It concluded that Mondelēz had infringed the competition rules, firstly by engaging in anti-competitive agreements and concerted practices to restrict cross-border trade in various products and, secondly, by abusing its dominant position in certain national markets for the sale of chocolate tablets.
The Commission has highlighted that Mondelēz had engaged in no less than 22 agreements or concerted practices to limit the resale territories of Mondelēz products to seven wholesale customers (traders).
Retailers, the Commission has explained, try to procure products in the internal market in territories where prices are lower in order to sell them in markets where prices are higher, which increases competition and therefore puts downward pressure on prices in countries where prices are higher: this is parallel trade.
The Commission also found that between 2015 and 2019, Mondelēz had abused its dominant position by refusing to supply a broker in Germany, thereby restricting the resale of chocolate tablets in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria and Romania, where prices were higher.
In addition, Mondelēz refused to supply chocolate tablets to the Netherlands in order to restrict their importation into Belgium, where the company was selling these products at higher prices.
“By restricting parallel trade, Mondelēz isolated national markets within the European Union from outside competition”, said Margrethe Vestager.
The calculation of the fine amount. In calculating the level of the fine, the Commission took into account the gravity and duration of the infringements of Mondelēz as well as the value of sales relating to these infringements, in accordance with the 2006 guidelines. However, since Mondelēz acknowledged its behaviour and cooperated with the Commission, the company was granted a 15% fine reduction. (Original version in French by Émilie Vanderhulst)