DOW Chemical and DuPont are reportedly on the losing end of the EU fine appeal to the top court to overturn the latter’s decisions and fines in relation to the synthetic rubber price fixing.
The EU Court of Justice in Luxembourg ditched the appeals and arguments that the companies’ responsibility for a unit that was part of a joint venture, had been wrongly assessed. The ruling is final, it said.
The EU Commission imposed a total of EUR247.6 million (US$334.4 million)fines against companies including Dow, DuPont and Eni SpA (ENI).
Dow, the largest US chemical maker, and DuPont were initially fined a combined total of EUR59.3 million. The companies were accused of colluding on prices for chloroprene rubber, used in the rubber industry or as latex, from at least 1993 to 2002. Both companies lost challenges at a lower EU court last year. Dow challenged the EU decision as incorrect for assigning direct liability to the company, instead of limiting its liability for the subsidiary’s actions based on its joint venture with DuPont. Dow Chemical transferred its stake in the joint venture to Wilmington, Delaware-based DuPont in 2005 and it was renamed DuPont Performance Elastomers LLC. Dow lost with arguments that it is “impossible for the parent companies of a joint venture” to exercise decisive influence and to be held liable in a cartel case. The EU court said Dow’s claims are “unfounded” because the commission’s had decided that the company had exercised a decisive influence over the unit “on the basis of factors which, unless they have been distorted, cannot be called into question on appeal.”