Reseña del seminario “Quién puede armonizar las acciones de reparación de daños y perjuicios en Derecho de la competencia europeo”

El pasado día 20 de octubre se celebró el quinto seminario BlogEuropa.eu 2008, dentro de programa “Hablamos de Europa” del Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, sobre “Quién puede armonizar las acciones de reparación de daños y perjuicios en Derecho de la competencia europeo”, impartido por Charlotte Leskinen, inspectora en la Comisión Finlandesa de Defensa de la Competencia y ayudante de investigación en el Instituto de Empresa, y con respuestas de Luis Ortiz Blanco, Profesor de Derecho Internacional Privado en la Universidad Complutense de Madrid y de Procedimientos de Competencia y Defensa Comercial en el Colegio de Europa, Brujas.

Charlotte Leskinen empezó su análisis recordando que el Tribunal de Justicia ha declarado que los artículos 81 y 82 TCE tienen efecto directo y ha establecido que existe un derecho comunitario a la reparación de daños y perjuicios sufridos como consecuencia del incumplimiento de las normas comunitarias de defensa de la competencia, lo que significa que cualquier persona puede solicitar la reparación del perjuicio que le haya causado una infracción de los artículos 81 y 82 TCE. (more…)

Solving the crisis without the European Union?

José M. de Areilza

October 23, 2008

It is too early to know if the measures taken by governments everywhere will be enough to create confidence and solve the credit crisis. But what is already clear is that the EU has not been an important actor so far in the global attempt to rescue the system. Moreover, these past weeks national governments have used the EU to back national measures already taken by them, often in rivalry with each other. They have ignored largely EU institutions, EU procedures and norms and EU principles governing EMU and the internal market. Intergovermentalism and improvised directorates have prevailed over the “Community method”.

With Sarkozy at the helm and reconnecting with the worst French “dirigisme”, there is even talk in Europe about creating national Sovereign Wealth Funds to compete with the SWF’s from China, South East Asia, Russia or other oil countries, even though normally these funds are opaque, politicized and unaccountable structures, and do not meet very basic corporate governance standards. Sarkozy’s suggestion to stay as super-president of the Eurogroup -why not life tenure as Préfet of G-4?- is also a way to contest the legitimate right of the Czech Republic to hold the rotating presidency of the Council from January 1, 2009.

The worst of all is that the EU system of economic governance needs to be strengthened at least to offer common financial supervision and to speak with one voice on international monetary issues. But future transfers of power to the EU seems to be out of the question, after we have seen who and how we decide on the exceptional moment.

Perder la guerra buena

J. Ignacio Torreblanca

6 de octubre, 2008

¿Se puede perder la guerra buena y ganar la mala? Afganistán siempre fue la guerra buena e Irak la mala. La primera estuvo justificada en razón de los talibanes y la amenaza terrorista, la segunda se basó en mentiras y sus objetivos siempre fueron bastardos. En Afganistán se aplicó la legalidad internacional, en Irak se violó. Por ello, España retiró sus tropas de Irak, pero a cambio las ha mantenido en Afganistán.

La guerra de Afganistán dura ya más que la II Guerra Mundial, y las perspectivas son sombrías
Ahora, sin embargo, nos encontramos ante una situación desconcertante: la guerra mala va bien, pero la guerra buena es un desastre. En Irak, kurdos, chiíes y suníes están aprendiendo a convivir: han pactado una legislación electoral que permitirá que se celebren elecciones municipales el próximo enero y parecen estar a punto de acordar un reparto equitativo de los ingresos del petróleo. (more…)

Five steps to solve the financial crisis

Pablo Diaz de Rábago

October 7, 2004

1.- Deposit stability. Via increased State guarantee schemes (will take 1 minute).
2.- Liquidity boost. Via TARP or BCE discount window or mix (will take 1-3 months). Lower interest rates, check weekly Monetary Supply and Credit Growth numbers. Reflate!
3.- Orderly recap. Assign the losses and recapitalize (will take 3 years). Moderate and manage the process (from now on only driven by government rescue and resale) by limiting capital erosion (do not eliminate mark-to-market but laminate effects over asset maturity)
4.- Consolidating champions. Avoid, to the extent possible, regional monopolies and political mingling (will take 1 year).
5.- More aggressive global wage inflation (decoupled from housing meltdown impact) to avoid wage deflation. Use liquidity, tax-withholding, – rates or even regulation.
6.- Do not worry about creating another housing asset bubble. With the panic, crunch and fall in prices, it will not happen for another generation.
Can Europe take steps 2, 3, 4 and 5?
Whilst 3 and 4 will happen in the market (except for political filibustering), 2 is essential to keep the system going and will have to be put in place. 5 will probably come naturally with a return to real economic growth in a couple of years.
Can Europe risk losing non-EMU or marginal economies? Look at the interbank positions and see that the money at risk is global.

What is an “European bank” and who decides who decides?

José M. de Areilza

October 3, 2008

The global financial crisis is putting the EU system of economic governance to a serious test. The single currency was launched without the rest of the building blocks of an economic federal government. Probably more economic centralization and central coordination was needed but it did not happen after the euro was created on May 2, 1998 nor in the subsequent years -finishing the economic architecture was not even part of the failed constitutional project.

Hence, the supervision and inspection of the financial system is still in the hands of Member States and the EU budget never grew to include enough European resources to use in an European wide /global crisis like the present one. Structural reforms also have been national matters, once the 2000 Lisbon Agenda has faded away. Let’s face it, we have an incomplete system of economic governance in a rather successful single market that is based on non discrimination, freedom of establishment and free movement of capital, and that is of course part of the global financial market.

So, in the present situation of financial crisis, do we still call national banks those who operate in the single market but do it largely according to national rules? Or do we treat them as European banks and seek a common European policy that takes into account all the “negative externalities” out there? The answer is important because consumer protection and guarantee of deposits will depend on it and there are important differences among national legislations, institutional designs and economic means to eventually rescue financial institutions and protect citizens interests.

The Irish have gone their way and irritated other Member States and the EU institutions by taking unilateral measures that discriminate between Irish and non Irish banks, a kind of an emergency State aid, probably agains the EU norms. But the underlying problem is not the Irish government, is the lack of a European policy that would allow EU political institutions to work with national ones and intervene efficiently in the current crisis, i.e., not taking four years to pass a new directive. Even the US with its well established federal system has had problems coordinating states and federal institutions in this area of economic regulation before the crisis.