EnglishThe Competition Council investigation concerning a possible unlawful agreement among entities operating on the banking and interbank market is far from a conclusion, one year after it started, representatives of the Council informed.
Competition Council President Bogdan Chiritoiu explained to BURSA that such investigations took longer because of the large volume of documents to be reviewed. He emphasized that the time allocated for such investigations was close to the European average.
"We do not expect this investigation to be concluded too soon. Anyway, the average duration of an investigation conducted by us is two years, because there is a lot to review," Chiritoiu added.
On 31 October 2008, the Competition Council announced the start of an investigation on several banks following media reports and information received from the National Bank of Romania. Competition Council representatives stated that the fair competition problems in the banking sector included "an excessive increase in interest rates, for both loans and deposits."
Bankers denied any alleged agreement on concerted actions on the interbank market or on an alleged attack on the national currency. Of the ten banks that were audited, only BRD - Groupe Societe Generale did not grant timely access to the Competition Council auditors and refused to accept an unannounced inspection. Shortly thereafter, in end-October 2008, the bank was fined 19 million RON (over 5 million EUR) for such conduct. In December 2008, BRD - Groupe Societe General contested the Competition Council fine in court, arguing that the fine was illegal and groundless.
This was the second time in the history of the Competition Council when an entity was fined for refusing to comply with an unannounced inspection. The legal framework on competition defines such refusal as a misdemeanour punishable by a fine equal to one per cent of the turnover reported for the year prior to the fine.
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