CADE study evaluates benefits of its actions for competition defence in 2022

The Department of Economic Studies of the Administrative Council for Economic Defense published on 14 March the working document titled Mensuração dos benefícios esperados da atuação do Cade em 2022. The study follows the global trend of antitrust authorities assessing the impact of their actions and disclosing them to society.

The fifth edition of the document estimates that CADE's actions in 2022 resulted in benefits of about BRL 12.46 billion. Of this amount, BRL 6 billion came from cases related to mergers and acquisitions, BRL 5.3 billion from cartel cases and BRL 1.1 billion from cases involving unilateral conduct.

The publication has six sections discussing specific topics as the cases judged by the antitrust authority, including a description of the proceedings, the methodology adopted to calculate the expected impacts, estimates of benefits, and analyses of the sensitivities of the results achieved.

According to the Department of Economic Studies, the estimates presented do not incorporate the dynamic or deterrent effects of the decisions nor the impact of specific actions promoted by the agency, such as educational and cultural activities to foster free competition. These observations further reinforce the relevance of the numbers obtained, given the conservative nature of the estimates presented in the study.

Moreover, according to the department, the disclosure of the data is a significant effort to guarantee greater transparency regarding the actions carried out by the authority and indicate their importance. The study, published annually, is based on the recommendations of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and has become one of the most relevant publications issued by CADE.

Access the working document (Portuguese only).