Article 101.º, law in books, law in action and the real world

In this article, published in the Revista de Concorrência e Regulação on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Circle of Portuguese Competition Lawyers, Eduardo Maia Cadete, a partner in Morais Leitão's European and Competition team, discusses the theme of the CAPCD's 10th anniversary conference, "Restrictions of a horizontal nature by object, what stage are we at?".
This article is a summary of the main thoughts expressed in a presentation made at the 10th anniversary conference of the Portuguese Competition Lawyers' Circle, held at the Faculty of Law of the University of Lisbon on April 12, 2019, on the sub-theme Horizontal restrictions by object, what stage are we at? Among the classic para-illegal agreements (nota bene each case is a case) between competitors, by object are the conduct of fixing prices for the sale of products to third parties, limiting production or sales and sharing markets or customers. The temporary narrowing of the door to restrictions by object occurred, it seems to me, with the Cartes bancaires judgment, C-67/131, in which the Court established that the concept of restriction of competition by object "must be interpreted restrictively", in an attempt to deflate DG COMP's para-discretionary power to target conduct by object. Even so, and given that legal science is not mathematical, and subjectivity and legal uncertainty often prevail to the detriment of companies, the Court, with tail winds for DG COMP, has been reinforcing the validity of restrictions by object to other types of so-called non-classical conduct.