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Competition policy – annual report 2024

TA-10-2025-0104 · P10_TA(2025)0104 · PE765.240

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Written by a language model from the full text only; every figure comes from the text. The paragraph links open the paragraph a statement rests on — check the text itself before relying on it.

Parliament's resolution on the 2024 competition policy annual report calls for a competition policy that supports EU goals like sustainability and competitiveness, while warning against market concentration and State aid fragmentation. It urges the Commission to update merger rules, address digital market dominance, enforce rules rigorously, and involve Parliament more in shaping policy.

Key points

  1. Reaffirms competition policy's role in protecting consumers and markets, and calls for it to support EU policies on sustainability, energy, defence and digitalisation.
  2. Calls for international cooperation and coordination among competition authorities, including via second-generation agreements and the European Competition Network.
  3. Supports investment in sustainable competitiveness and policies promoting innovation, but stresses that industrial policy must not lead to market dominance or distortion.
  4. Calls for State aid to be consistent with EU objectives, barring companies in tax havens, and for monitoring to prevent fragmentation and subsidy competition.
  5. Notes that market concentration has increased, harming consumers and growth, and calls for effective merger control and enforcement.
  6. Calls for IPCEIs to have genuine EU added value and for State aid notifications to be completed within six months.
  7. Acknowledges the need for EUR 800 billion per year in investment and supports the Savings and Investments Union and Draghi report's action areas.
  8. Calls for swift use of trade instruments against foreign subsidies and for addressing new forms of collusion like algorithmic collusion.
  9. Invites analysis of a 'new competition tool' and calls for better use of structural remedies and interim measures in antitrust cases.
  10. Calls for assessing competition rules' impact on housing and services of general economic interest, and for flexibility in funding remote regions.
  11. Calls for updating merger rules to address killer acquisitions and digital market power, including an internal market legal base and innovation defence.
  12. Urges enforcement in digital, financial, agricultural and other sectors, including new investigations into cloud services and review of the Interchange Fee Regulation.

Who is affected

  • The Commission and national competition authorities, which are called on to enforce rules and coordinate.
  • Companies receiving State aid, which may face new conditions and bans if based in tax havens.
  • Digital platforms and gatekeepers, which face stricter scrutiny and interoperability obligations.
  • Credit rating agencies and audit firms, which face potential impact assessments and conflict-of-interest checks.
  • International card schemes, which may face regulatory changes to fees.

Figures and deadlines

  • EUR 800 billion per year needed for EU competitiveness, as estimated in the Draghi report.
  • 77 % of State aid notified accounted for by only two Member States.
  • 0,7 % of notified mergers blocked or withdrawn since 2004.
  • Three largest credit rating agencies hold over 90 % market share.

Legal basis: Articles 101 to 109 TFEU