Oreo-maker – Mondelez, the maker of Oreo chocolate and Cadbury Dairy Milk, has been fined €337.5 million ($366 million) for hindering trade in chocolate, biscuits & coffee between European Union countries to keep prices high.
Margrethe Vestager, the EU’s competition chief, said on Thursday that Mondelez had illegally limited cross-border sales within the EU to maintain higher prices for its products.
“This case is about the price of food. “It is a key concern for European citizens and even more obviously in times of very high inflation, where many find themselves in a cost of living crisis,” she added during a press conference.
The European Commission, which began investigating the case in 2019, found that Mondelez International MDLZ had deliberately restricted cross-border trade and abused “its dominant position” in some national markets for the sale of chocolate bars. A formal investigation began in 2021.
Oreo-maker
Among other things, the company had stopped supplying chocolate bars in the Netherlands to prevent them from being imported into Belgium, where Mondelez was selling the same products at higher prices, the EU’s executive arm said in the statement.
“This historic matter is not representative of who we are or the strong compliance culture we strive for… That is why we will continue to emphasize our overall compliance culture and have strengthened our annual mandatory compliance program to reflect the learning,” he said. the spokesperson added.
“The commission concluded that Mondelez’s illegal practices prevented retailers from freely sourcing products in EU member states at lower prices,” he added.Oreo-maker
A spokesperson for Mondelez International said the sanction concerned “isolated incidents, most of which ceased or were remedied long before the commission’s investigation.”
Mondelez made an accrual for the fine last year and no further measures will be necessary to finance it.Oreo-maker
According to the EU, the company’s illegal practices date back to 2006 and include refusing to supply a wholesaler in Germany to prevent the resale of chocolate bars in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, and Romania, where prices were higher. In another case, Mondelez required a client to charge higher prices for exports compared to domestic sales.