PRESS RELEASE

ANTITRUST: INCREASE IN REQUESTS TO OBTAIN THE LEGALITY RATING

Requests are still on the increase for the acquisition of the legality Rating, issued by the Antitrust Authority. During the first two months of 2015 the Competition and Market Guarantor Authority, headed by Giovanni Pitruzzella, respectively received 83 applications in January ( 14% compared to December 2014) and 133 in February ( 60%). Out of 49 cases finalized in January, the rating allocations were 37, with three refusals and nine archived cases (due to lack of requirements). During the last month, instead, the allocations have risen to 54 out of a total 77 cases, with one confirmation (following a change to the company registration data), three refusals, one revocation and 18 archived cases.

Already during 2014 the requests had more than doubled compared to 2013.          From 142 files in the first year, when the Agcm (Competition and Market Guarantor Authority)’s Code came into force, the number rose last year, when the requests were 402, and from there to the present overall total of 760 (February 2015).

Approved by Parliament at the end of 2012, the legality Rating is the “rewarding” tool whereby the task was entrusted to the Antitrust Authority of assigning a score, from one to three “stars”, to the virtuous companies, with a turnover exceeding two million Euros per year, which meet a series of juridical requirements. In order to obtain one “star”, the owner of the company and the other managers should not have any previous criminal or tax-related convictions. Besides not having been convicted during the previous two-year period due to anti-trust offences, the company must make payments and carry out financial transactions in excess of one thousand Euros purely through traceable means. In order to obtain a higher score, the Code sets out six other requirements: two “stars” where half of them are met and three “stars” where all of them are met.

“Regard is paid” to the Rating allocated by the Antitrust Authority, according to what is envisaged by law, “at the stage of financing being granted by the public administrations, as well as at the stage of gaining access to bank credit”. By virtue of the selfsame legislation, “the credit institutions which fail to take into account the allocated rating at the stage of granting financing to companies shall be required to forward to the Bank of Italy a detailed report on the reasons for the decision taken”.

Overall, from the moment in which the Code came into force until now, 362 legality Ratings have been positively allocated, compared to 18 refusals. The complete list of companies that have obtained such acknowledgment, along with the relevant score, is published on the website of the Competition and Market Guarantor Authority (www.agcm.it).

Rome, 3 March 2015