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The Inefficiency of Quasi–Per Se Rules: Regulating Information Exchange in EU and U.S. Antitrust Law
Author(s) -
Khoo Kenneth,
Soh Jerrold
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
american business law journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.248
H-Index - 23
eISSN - 1744-1714
pISSN - 0002-7766
DOI - 10.1111/ablj.12155
Subject(s) - competition law , european union , competition (biology) , ex ante , economics , competitor analysis , harm , law , law and economics , argument (complex analysis) , commercial law , political science , international trade , market economy , ecology , biochemistry , chemistry , macroeconomics , management , biology , monopoly
It is well understood that the exchange of information between horizontal competitors can violate competition law provisions in both the European Union (EU) and the United States, namely, article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and section 1 of the Sherman Act. However, despite ostensible similarities between EU and U.S. antitrust law concerning interfirm information exchange, substantial differences remain. In this article, we make a normative argument for the U.S. antitrust regime's approach, on the basis that the United States’ approach to information exchange is likely to be more efficient than the relevant approach under the EU competition regime. Using economic theories of harm concerning information exchange to understand the imposition of liability in relation to “stand‐alone” instances of information exchange, we argue that such liability must be grounded on the conception of a prophylactic rule. We characterize this rule as a form of ex ante regulation and explain why it has no ex post counterpart in antitrust law. In contrast to the U.S. antitrust regime, we argue that the implementation of such a rule pursuant to EU competition law leads to higher error costs without a significant reduction in regulatory costs. As a majority of jurisdictions have competition law regimes that resemble EU competition law more closely than U.S. antitrust law, our thesis has important implications for competition regimes around the world.