EU ANTITRUST: HOT TOPICS & NEXT STEPS

Prague, Czechia

EU ANTITRUST: HOT TOPICS & NEXT STEPS 2022

In practice, a public authority often requires the conclusion of a surety agreement as security for the repayment of the loan. It is also possible to use a declaration of patronage, which is known in the legal orders of Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, or Italy. The content of such a declaration may take the form of a non binding declaration of goodwill (soft patronage declarations) or be similar to a surety or include an assurance of payment of compensation in the event of failure to meet a secured claim (hard patronage declarations) (Heropolitańska, 2018). Such a declaration or surety agreement are intended to increase the debtor’s financial credibility. 4. Conclusions The above considerations concerning the support of sports clubs by state authorities clearly confirm that the issue of supporting such entities is both interesting and extremely complex from the legal point of view. This is because it is related to the specificity of the issue of public aid, its multifaceted legal regulation and the tools it consists of – examples of the interpenetration of public law and private law (border law). The Member States of the European Union are obliged to comply with very complex and rigorous provisions of law in the field of state aid, acting in accordance with the procedures for granting financial support to entities (in particular those operating for profit – enterprises). If the de minimis aid threshold is exceeded and the Private Investor Test and Private Creditor Test are not met, there is a real risk that the European Commission will impose a decision ordering the refund. The European Commission has extensive powers of a controlling (and even supervisory) nature. It supervises the application of EU law in the area of ​state aid (under the control of the Court of Justice of the EU) – having extensive powers to control its granting by Member States to certain enterprises or the production of certain goods, as well as taking appropriate decisions in these matters (Stankiewicz, 2016). The provisions of European Union law allow for the application of appropriate legal remedies – an appeal against the decision of the European Commission to the Court of Justice of the EU. As the Commission is empowered to exercise imperative measures, it must comply with the obligation to provide detailed explanations of all factual and legal circumstances. The use of presumptions is in fact unacceptable, and they are often a decisive factor in a court’s decision to annul a decision. State aid granted by the state to sports clubs requires an in-depth analysis in any event, including: whether it does not affect trade between Member States and whether it does not strengthen the company’s position compared to other competing undertakings. In assessing the support in the light of the provisions

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