HEAD OF THE FAS RUSSIA ON RESPONSE MEASURES OF ANTIMONOPOLY CONTROL IN THE CONDITIONS OF MODERN "DIGITAL" MARKETS

Digital platforms were able to manage commodity markets, determine the rules of the “game”, and manipulate demand.

As an example of possible abuse is the imposition on sellers and buyers of additional services and facilities affiliated to the platforms as usual.

“Digital platforms are beginning to impact traditional markets by transmitting consumer data collected online. “The Fifth Antimonopoly Package” is aimed at solving this,” the Head of the FAS Russia said during the plenary session of the Antimonopoly Forum 2021.

“The Fifth Package” provides for measures that will allow antimonopoly law to create barriers to abuse in digital markets:

- the spread of prohibitions on abuse of a dominant position to digital platforms (marketplaces, aggregators) that ensure transactions between sellers and buyers on the Internet;

- determination of the criteria for such platforms: ownership of the program (infrastructure), which is used to conclude transactions between buyers and sellers; network effects; more than 35%  share in the market of interchangeable services to ensure the possibility of making transactions; revenue of over 400 million rubles for the last calendar year from the platform's activities;

- new approaches to transactions of economic concentration: if the transaction price exceeds 7 billion rubles, it requires the approval of the FAS Russia (especially relevant for markets where companies that own information technologies and the results of intellectual activity operate);

- usage of digital algorithms in anti-competitive agreements should be an aggravating circumstance.

The adoption of the Fifth Package will ensure the effectiveness of antimonopoly control measures in the conditions of modern “digital” markets, increase the protection of the rights and interests of bona fide participants in such markets from possible manifestations of monopolistic activities, and create legal mechanisms to counter the abuse of market power by “digital monopolies” and “digital cartels”. It is currently under consideration by the Government.