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Micula v Romania  ∙ Commission Decision SA.385 ∙ Annotation by Emanuela Matei

Emanuela Matei


In 1999, Romania adopted a fiscal aid scheme and later has repealed it for reasons of incompatibility with the provisions of national legislation on the implementation of EU State aid rules. Within the procedural framework provided by the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) Convention, the repeal of those fiscal benefits led to a liability to pay damages of circa € 85 million. While the arbitral tribunal stated that the repeal implied a breach of legitimate expectations, the European Commission considers that the implementation of the tribunal award represents unlawful State aid. The analysis identifies certain gaps in the Commission examination, notably, the lack of an economic assessment of the amount of aid paid as fiscal benefits and the use of ‘normal market conditions’ test for the scrutiny of State interventions that qualify as exercise of public authority.
Keywords: State Resources; Imputability; Procedure before the Commission; Regional Aid Scheme.

Associate Researcher at the Centre of European Legal Studies, Bucharest. Juris Master in European Business Law (Lund University, June 2012), Magister legum (Lund University, June 2010), BSc in Economics & Business Administration (Lund University, June 2009).

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