Crime Of Price Manipulation And Punishment

Core tip: compared with foreign countries, China's civil punishment is not enough, and there is no criminal liability, making the law price monopoly agreement, especially horizontal.

Unilever and Procter & Gamble will be fined by the European Union's anti-monopoly agency on Wednesday, according to reports.

The brand of laundry powder involved is Omo, Surf, Tide (Tide), Gain and times (Era), and BAOYING (Persil).

Earlier, Unilever, Procter & Gamble, Libai and Venus four daily chemical giants also "coincide" to the daily chemical products prices, the average price increase of about 10%, but ultimately in the development and Reform Commission "interview" only postponed.

Price manipulation

If a final settlement with Unilever and other companies is reached, it will be the fourth time that the European Union has started a fine settlement procedure for similar cases.

In the 5 years ending 2010, the European Commission has issued a total of 12 billion euros for the price Union's manipulation of market prices.

The European Commission is liable to a maximum penalty of 10% of the illegal revenue of the European Union that violates the antitrust laws of the European Union.

Unilever's annual revenue reached $55 billion 352 million, while Procter & Gamble's revenue reached $79 billion 697 million.

This means that Unilever and Procter & Gamble will face a fine of up to $5 billion 500 million and $8 billion respectively, once price manipulation is established.

Another German actor, Henkel, who was involved in the case, although he was also involved, but because of tainted witnesses, he could provide evidence of monopoly for the European Union and may escape fines.

Torres, a spokesman for the European Commission, said the total amount of fines could be reduced by 10% if companies were willing to "surrender" and admit that they were involved in the price Union.

Paul Fox, spokesman for Procter & Gamble, said: "many manufacturers in our industry are facing the antitrust investigation of the European Union."

But he declined to comment further.

In March this year, L'OREAL, Procter & Gamble and Henkel, which occupied 70% market share in Spain's shampoo and hair care products, were also accused by the Spanish National Competition Commission, which manipulated prices between 1989 and 2008. At last, the Spanish Spanish branch was fined 23 million 200 thousand euros, while the P & G Spanish branch was fined 12 million euros.

In contrast, China's foreign chemicals giant also plays a decisive role in China's daily chemical industry.

China cosmetics network released the industry blue book shows that in 2010, China daily chemical market sales is expected to reach 206 billion 817 million yuan, an increase of 10.9%.

Foreign brands occupy more than 70% of the market share.

Does price manipulation exist in China?

"The situation of price manipulation is far more serious in China than in other countries."

Li Zhiqi, who works in marketing, thinks.

But Tu Junguang, consultant of China hairdressing and Beauty Association, thinks that the daily chemical industry has the characteristics of large selectivity and serious homogenization.

"Most of them are price controls at the dealer level."

For example, OLAY ex factory price of 25% off -7.8 discount, but the price to the terminal is not necessarily, which has a certain relationship with the dealer's roasted goods.

Chinese Anti price monopoly

In January 4th, the national development and Reform Commission issued the "anti price monopoly regulations" and "anti price monopoly administrative enforcement procedures", prohibiting operators from monopolization and manipulating prices, and the new regulations were formally implemented from February 1, 2011.

On the same day, the NDRC also informed the Zhejiang Paper Industry Association of Fuyang of Zhejiang that it had organized the industry operators to reach a monopoly agreement on changing or fixed prices and imposed a fine of up to 500 thousand yuan.

But since then, few cases of anti price monopoly have emerged.

Li Zhiqi believes that this is not related to the evidence collection and identification of anti price monopoly. "Generally speaking, this communication is relatively implicit. Many times, it is just a tacit agreement, not a marketers in the market, it's hard for you to master this kind of evidence."

He also believes that the phenomenon of price manipulation is widespread in convenience food, wine industry, dairy industry and so on.

Wang Dingmian, a senior dairy expert, told reporters that over the years, he and some people in the industry have been tracking the behavior of foreign dairy giants in manipulating prices, but in the end they can not find conclusive evidence.

According to Wang Dingmian, since 2005, several big foreign milk powder giants have launched a wave of price increases every one or two years. In recent years, the frequency of such price rises has also been encrypted.

Every time the price rises, a foreign infant milk powder giant launched the lead. After a month or two, other foreign milk powder giants also completed the price increase, and the price increase was mostly similar.

"Every time we raise prices, we have calculated and drills many times, including feed, supply of goods, changes in international milk futures, tariffs, pportation, crude oil and other factors. It is found that there may be 1-2 links in cost price changes, but on the whole, it is basically insufficient to achieve the price increase of foreign milk powder companies."

In addition, Zhang Qing, lawyer of Guangdong Guang Xin law firm, believes that the difficulty of price fixing or manipulation in obtaining evidence and identification is still: first, there is a lack of a detailed standard for determining the extent of price fluctuation.

For example, it is obviously higher or obviously lower than the obvious standard; how to identify the rate of change between commodity price and cost; secondly, the standard of market dominant position is vague, leaving the operational space of the administrative organ too large; finally, some large manufacturers carry out the national unified retail price for some products, whether they are suspected of price manipulation, because the actual cost of each district will inevitably be inconsistent because of the cost of region and pportation, so the unified retail price is also open to question.

Palliative and permanent cure

In Li Zhiqi's view, "some enterprises occupy a large share of the industry, which has strangled the vitality of many enterprises."

Zhang Qing lawyers said that the current US anti-monopoly law is mainly composed of the Sherman law, the Clayton act, the Federal Trade Commission Act and the special laws that are related to these laws and related laws.

In the identification of antitrust behavior, manipulation of prices is an important factor.

Zhang Qing also said that compared with foreign countries, China's civil punishment is not enough, it only stipulates simple civil compensation, but does not stipulate punitive damages system. Two, there is no criminal liability, so that the law does not have enough tough regulation power for the price monopoly agreement, especially the "serious violation" and "illegal" behavior of horizontal price monopoly, and the four is the lack of detailed operational guidelines.

Japanese airlines, Australian airways, British Airways and other 21 airlines have collusion in the United States collectively rose prices, the total penalty by the United States more than 1 billion 700 million U.S. dollars.

At the same time, "interview" is also considered to be one of the means to curb price manipulation.

But the industry responded differently.

NDRC recently interviewed 17 trade associations, including the National Federation of industry and commerce, the China Food Industry Association, the general merchandise business association and the Dairy Association.

Tu Junguang, consultant of China hairdressing and Beauty Association, thinks that it is necessary for the country to control speculation.

But Li Zhiqi pointed out that interviews are only temporary solutions. "Some enterprises are indeed rising demand because of the causes of the industrial chain or the cost, and the problem of price should be handed over to the market to solve."