Guest lecture Franziska Weber

In this BACT seminar, some comparative legal and economic research on cartel damage from an ongoing book project will be presented by Franziska Weber. Cartel damage, if we think of a classical price-fixing cartel that overcharged its purchasers, consists of quite a number of damage components that taken together are a major cost to society. This presentation will consider three of those damage components in more detail – the overcharge paid by the direct purchaser, the damage amount that the direct purchaser passed on to the indirect purchaser and the profit lost in this exercise (the volume effect). The European Directive 104/2014 stipulates a number of provisions to facilitate claiming “full compensation” when harmed by a violation of competition law. There is, however, reason for concern when it comes to the incentives to sue generated for all three components. It will be shown that the Directive pays particularly little attention to the volume effect – a decision that goes against economic insights. It will, furthermore, be illustrated that the civil procedural law of the most promising jurisdictions when it comes to successfully handling the pass-on and the resulting volume effect (Germany, the Netherlands and Spain) do, nevertheless, show some potential of curing the Directive’s omissions.

The guest lecture is open to all who are interested and free of charge. However, advance registration is required via info.bact@law.eur.nl.