by Jonathan J. Rusch

On April 1, the European Commission (EC) and the United Kingdom Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) simultaneously announced that they had imposed fines collectively totaling more than €549 million against a total of 17 leading car manufacturers and two trade groups, the European Automobiles Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) and the Society of Motor Manufacturers & Traders (SMMT), for conducting a more than 15-year cartel pertaining to “end-of-life” vehicle recycling.[1]

The EC announced that the conduct of the firms and the ACEA violated Article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and Article 53 of the European Economic Agreement, which “prohibit agreements and other restrictive business practices that may affect trade and prevent or restrict competition within the Single Market.”[2] The CMA announced that the conduct of the firms, the ACEA, and the SMMT constituted two single and continuous “by object” infringements of section 2(1) of the Competition Act 1998 (i.e., that the conduct had as its object the restriction or distortion of competition within the United Kingdom).[3] This post will summarize and discuss the two agencies’ actions and identify pertinent lessons to be learned.

The EC Action

Under European Union Directive 2000/53/EC on end-of-life vehicles (ELVs), “the last owner of an ELV must be able to dispose of it at no cost with a dismantler and if needed, car manufacturers are obliged to bear the costs. Moreover, consumers are required to be informed about the recycling performance of new cars.”[4]

The EC investigation founds that, for more than 15 years, from May 29, 2002 to September 4, 2017, 16 major car manufacturers and the ACEA entered into anticompetitive agreements and engaged in concerted practices related to the recycling of ELVs, constituting a single and continuous infringement in the European Economic Area (EEA).

In particular, the Commission found that the parties colluded on two aspects:

• “[T]hey agreed not to pay car dismantlers for processing ELVs. In particular, they agreed to consider the recycling of ELVs to be a sufficiently profitable business, and therefore not to remunerate car dismantlers for their services (so-called “Zero-Treatment-Cost” strategy). The companies also shared commercially sensitive information on their individual agreements with car dismantlers and coordinated their behaviour towards dismantlers”; and
• “[T]hey agreed not to promote how much of an ELV can be recycled, recovered and reused and how much recycled material is used in new cars. Their goal was to prevent consumers from considering recycling information when choosing a car, which could lower the pressure on companies to go beyond legal requirements.”[5]

In addition to the approximately €458 million in manufacturers’ fines, which ranged from €81,461,000 down to €1,034,000, the EC separately fined the ACEA €500,000.  The EC found that “ACEA was the facilitator of the cartel, having organised numerous meetings and contacts between car manufacturers involved in the cartel.”

Because they disclosed the existence of the cartel to the EC pursuant to the EC’s corporate leniency program,[6] one of the manufacturers, Mercedes-Benz, was not fined and four other manufacturers (Stellantis (including Opel), Mitsubishi, and Ford) received reduced fines.  In addition, the EC gave a 10 percent fine reduction to all parties, as they acknowledged their participation in the cartel and their liability.[7]

The CMA Action

In the United Kingdom, car manufacturers are legally required to include, among other sustainability information, details on recyclability in their advertising materials, so that customers can take that information into account when considering a vehicle’s “green” credentials before buying.

The CMA investigation found that from May 2002 to September 2017, ten manufacturers illegally agreed that they would not advertise if their vehicles went above the minimum recyclability requirement of 85 percent, even if the actual percentage was higher.  (An eleventh manufacturer joined the agreement in September 2008.) All but one of the manufacturers also agreed not to share information with their customers about the percentage of recycled material used in their vehicles.[8]

The manufacturers memorialized their agreement in a document called the “ELV Charta” “and sought to ‘avoid a competitive race’ among the manufacturers in relation to the type of advertising claims described above.” This written agreement “was referenced in emails, internal documents and meeting minutes, and certain manufacturers challenged others when they breached this agreement.”[9]

Moreover, from April 2004 to May 2018, eight car manufacturers agreed among themselves that they would not pay companies to handle the recycling of their customers’ ELVs. This effectively meant that “the companies providing this service were unable to negotiate a price with manufacturers.”

Other companies and bodies later joined the unlawful agreement, including the ACEA and the SMMT.  The CMA stated that the manufacturers used ACEA meetings to facilitate these arrangements, with the ACEA itself chairing meetings and intervening when manufacturers acted outside of the terms.  The SMMT also attended these meetings and became involved by settling a handful of disputes.[10]

In addition to the approximately £77,650,517 in manufacturers’ fines, which ranged from £18,541,929 down to £123,072, the EC separately fined the ACEA £22,800 and the SMMT £15,600.  Similar to the EC action, because they disclosed the existence of the cartel to the CMA pursuant to the CMA’s corporate leniency policy,[11] Mercedes-Benz was not fined and two other manufacturers and the SMMT received reduced fines.  All of the car manufacturers (except for Mercedes-Benz), the ACEA, and the SMMT admitted to taking part in illegal behavior and agreed to pay the fines.[12]

Lessons To Be Learned

The EC and CMA actions are significant reminders to companies doing business in Europe that antitrust compliance policies and programs need to look beyond traditional competition-law violations, such as price-fixing and market sharing, to identify other kinds of other illegal agreements and contacts that have the clear purpose of limiting competition.[13] In these cases, while the price-fixing pertained to car recyclers’ prices rather than car manufacturers’ retail prices, the long-running and coordinated conduct by the firms and trade groups were classic examples of illegal cartel behavior.

For those reasons, attorneys providing competition-law advice and compliance officers who oversee antitrust compliance programs should brief corporate senior leaders about these cases and identify key issues that senior leadership needs to recognize as core competition-law compliance problems.  Finally, because the cartel was established approximately two decades before the first of the car manufacturers disclosed its existence to the EC and the CMA, compliance officers should also consider expanding the timeframes of their antitrust/competition compliance reviews to identify the possible creation of illegal agreements.

Footnotes

[1] According to the EC, an End-of-Life Vehicle (ELV) “is a car that is no longer fit for use, either due to age, wear and tear, or damage. These vehicles are dismantled and processed for recycling, recovery, and disposal.”  European Commission, Commission fines car manufacturers and association €458 million over end-of-life vehicles recycling cartel, March 31, 2025, https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_25_881.

[2] Id.

[3] Competition and Markets Authority, Car industry settles competition law case, April 1, 2025, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/car-industry-settles-competition-law-case.  Although the date of the EC press release is March 31, the CMA stated that both announcements were made on April 1.

[4] European Commission, supra note 1.

[5] Id.

[6] See European Commission, Leniency, https://competition-policy.ec.europa.eu/antitrust-and-cartels/leniency_en.

[7] European Commission, supra note 1.

[8] Competition and Markets Authority, supra note 3.

[9] Id.

[10] Id.

[11] See Competition and Markets Authority, Cartels: come forward and apply for leniency, https://www.gov.uk/guidance/cartels-confess-and-apply-for-leniency.

[12] Competition and Markets Authority, supra note 3.

[13] See European Union, Competition rules in the EU, https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/selling-in-eu/competition-between-businesses/competition-rules-eu/index_en.htm.

Jonathan J. Rusch is Director of the U.S. and International Anti-Corruption Law Program and Adjunct Professor at American University Washington College of Law and a Senior Fellow with the NYU Program on Corporate Compliance and Enforcement at New York University Law School.

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