14 oil companies punished with fines of 4m euros, calculated prices

4m euros is the amount of penalties the Competition Authority has pronounced 14 oil companies that had manipulated prices.

KOHA has learned from its sources that it has proved that companies that were under investigation have upset commercial competition during November and December 2018.

Last November, the AKK had found evidence that the cause of oil prices, the profits of companies had increased by 124 percent. The authorities' doubts that oil companies have previously agreed on the increase in oil prices, this week they have received epilogue from the commission raised on the issue.

Following the procedure development, the Authority Commission, on May 6, 2020, has decided to issue administrative punitive measures in the 4m-euro total total of revenues for six-month-on-one months of 2018 to 14 companies under investigation.

According to information, all 14 companies, by their actions, have committed violations of the constitution's provisions for the Protection of Competition, Article 4 for “Forbidden agreements or co-ordinated practice” respectively.

The Kosovo Competition Authority on Friday will also publicise the names of individual companies and penalties for each. Although the allegations were that 14 companies, among them “Hib Petrol”, “Al-petrol”, “Ex”, “Lab Oil” of “Perol Company” had set the oil price at the end of 2018.

When investigations were launched, the Authority had stated that these companies earned profit for January-October months had about 9 %, while in November it was averaged 60%. In December, the average profit has been 124%.

The same allegations exist in terms of retail gasoline. More specifically, while the profit for January-October 2018 has been 12%, in December it has been