IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/ejlwec/v34y2012i2p365-389.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Stand-alone private antitrust damages: (how) should competition authorities react?

Author

Listed:
  • Claudio Calcagno

Abstract

The European Commission has recently set up a framework that facilitates the access to the courts by victims of antitrust injury, even in the absence of a ruling by a competition authority (so-called stand-alone private damages, or SPD, actions). Here, I study a game where both public and private antitrust enforcement play a role. Plaintiffs face information acquisition costs (evidence-gathering) if they want to bring an SPD action, but they do not internalise the opportunity cost of the courts’ resources. First, I show that any gain in deterrence has to be traded off against costly litigation and enforcement costs, and that these tradeoffs are heterogeneous across market sizes. Second, taking the competition authority’s actions as exogenous, SPDs can improve welfare only if the competition authority is sufficiently effective: private damages are a complement to (good) public enforcement, not a substitute. Third, a resource-constrained competition authority, upon the introduction of SPDs, should investigate a larger proportion of industries (even at the cost of a higher error rate). That is, whilst a “hands-off” approach might have been warranted absent SPDs, this is no longer true once stand-alone actions are introduced. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2012

Suggested Citation

  • Claudio Calcagno, 2012. "Stand-alone private antitrust damages: (how) should competition authorities react?," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 34(2), pages 365-389, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:kap:ejlwec:v:34:y:2012:i:2:p:365-389
    DOI: 10.1007/s10657-010-9177-8
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10657-010-9177-8
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10657-010-9177-8?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Shavell, Steven, 1997. "The Fundamental Divergence between the Private and the Social Motive to Use the Legal System," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 26(2), pages 575-612, June.
    2. Gary S. Becker, 1974. "Crime and Punishment: An Economic Approach," NBER Chapters, in: Essays in the Economics of Crime and Punishment, pages 1-54, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Schinkel, Maarten Pieter & Tuinstra, Jan, 2006. "Imperfect competition law enforcement," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 1267-1297, November.
    4. Polinsky, A. Mitchell & Rubinfeld, Daniel L., 1988. "The deterrent effects of settlements and trials," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 109-116, June.
    5. Motta, Massimo & Polo, Michele, 2003. "Leniency programs and cartel prosecution," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 347-379, March.
    6. Sylvain Bourjade & Patrick Rey & Paul Seabright, 2009. "Private Antitrust Enforcement In The Presence Of Pre‐Trial Bargaining," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(3), pages 372-409, September.
    7. Paul Milgrom & John Roberts, 1986. "Relying on the Information of Interested Parties," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 17(1), pages 18-32, Spring.
    8. Giovanni Immordino & Michele Polo, 2008. "Judicial Errors and Innovative Activity," Working Papers 337, IGIER (Innocenzo Gasparini Institute for Economic Research), Bocconi University.
    9. Hugh C. Briggs III & Kathleen D. Huryn & Mark E. McBride, 1996. "Treble Damages and the Incentive to Sue and Settle," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 27(4), pages 770-786, Winter.
    10. Hylton, Keith N., 2002. "An asymmetric-information model of litigation," International Review of Law and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(2), pages 153-175, August.
    11. Besanko, David & Spulber, Daniel F, 1989. "Antitrust Enforcement under Asymmetric Information," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 99(396), pages 408-425, June.
    12. Baker, Jonathan B, 1988. "Private Information and the Deterrent Effect of Antitrust Damage Remedies," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 4(2), pages 385-408, Fall.
    13. Elisabetta Iossa & Giuliana Palumbo, 2007. "Information Provision and Monitoring of the Decision-Maker in the Presence of an Appeal Process," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 163(4), pages 657-682, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Grajzl, Peter & Baniak, Andrzej, 2018. "Private enforcement, corruption, and antitrust design," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 284-307.
    2. Tim Reuter, 2012. "Private antitrust enforcement revisited: The role of private incentives to report evidence to the antitrust authority," Working Paper Series of the Department of Economics, University of Konstanz 2012-04, Department of Economics, University of Konstanz.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tim Reuter, 2012. "Private antitrust enforcement revisited: The role of private incentives to report evidence to the antitrust authority," Working Paper Series of the Department of Economics, University of Konstanz 2012-04, Department of Economics, University of Konstanz.
    2. Schinkel, Maarten Pieter & Tuinstra, Jan, 2006. "Imperfect competition law enforcement," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 1267-1297, November.
    3. Panayiotis Agisilaou, 2013. "Collusion in Industrial Economics and Optimally Designed Leniency Programmes - A Survey," Working Paper series, University of East Anglia, Centre for Competition Policy (CCP) 2013-03, Centre for Competition Policy, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK..
    4. Grajzl, Peter & Baniak, Andrzej, 2018. "Private enforcement, corruption, and antitrust design," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(1), pages 284-307.
    5. Andreea Cosnita-Langlais & Jean-Philippe Tropeano, 2018. "How procedures shape substance: institutional design and antitrust evidentiary standards," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 46(1), pages 143-164, August.
    6. Roldan, Flavia, 2011. "Covert networks and antitrust policy," IESE Research Papers D/932, IESE Business School.
    7. Joseph E. Harrington, 2005. "Optimal Cartel Pricing In The Presence Of An Antitrust Authority," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 46(1), pages 145-169, February.
    8. Flavia Roldán, 2012. "Collusive Networks in Market‐Sharing Agreements in the Presence of an Antitrust Authority," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(4), pages 965-987, December.
    9. Valadkhani, Abbas & Smyth, Russell, 2018. "Asymmetric responses in the timing, and magnitude, of changes in Australian monthly petrol prices to daily oil price changes," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 89-100.
    10. Harold Houba & Evgenia Motchenkova & Quan Wen, 2018. "Legal Principles in Antitrust Enforcement," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 120(3), pages 859-893, July.
    11. Carlos Ponce & Flavia Roldán, 2016. "Antitrust policies in network environments," Documentos de Investigación 112, Universidad ORT Uruguay. Facultad de Administración y Ciencias Sociales.
    12. Bodnar, Olivia & Fremerey, Melinda & Normann, Hans-Theo & Schad, Jannika Leonie, 2021. "The effects of private damage claims on cartel activity: Experimental evidence," DICE Discussion Papers 315, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE), revised 2021.
    13. Ghebrihiwet, N. & Motchenkova, E.I., 2010. "Leniency programs in the presence of judicial errors," Serie Research Memoranda 0008, VU University Amsterdam, Faculty of Economics, Business Administration and Econometrics.
    14. Michiel Bijlsma & Roel van Elk, 2008. "Opportunistic competition law enforcement," CPB Discussion Paper 110.rdf, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    15. Marvao, Catarina & Spagnolo, Giancarlo & Buccirossi, Paolo, 2015. "Leniency and Damages," SITE Working Paper Series 32, Stockholm School of Economics, Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics, revised 13 Jan 2016.
    16. Steven Shavell & A. Mitchell Polinsky, 2000. "The Economic Theory of Public Enforcement of Law," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 38(1), pages 45-76, March.
    17. Andrew J. Holliday & Gregory P. Hopper, 1996. "Are there regimes of antitrust enforcement? An empirical analysis," Working Papers 96-21, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    18. Emilie Dargaud & Andrea Mantovani & Carlo Reggiani, 2013. "The fight against cartels: a transatlantic perspective," Post-Print halshs-00944334, HAL.
    19. Polinsky, A. Mitchell & Shavell, Steven, 2007. "The Theory of Public Enforcement of Law," Handbook of Law and Economics, in: A. Mitchell Polinsky & Steven Shavell (ed.), Handbook of Law and Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 6, pages 403-454, Elsevier.
    20. Tim Reuter, 2017. "Endogenous Cartel Organization and Antitrust Fine Discrimination," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 51(3), pages 291-313, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Antitrust; Private enforcement; Competition authorities; Frivolous suits; Welfare; D21; K21; K41; K42; L12; L41;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D21 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Theory
    • K21 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - Antitrust Law
    • K41 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Litigation Process
    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
    • L12 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Monopoly; Monopolization Strategies
    • L41 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies - - - Monopolization; Horizontal Anticompetitive Practices

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:ejlwec:v:34:y:2012:i:2:p:365-389. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.