Presentations

Here you can find some presentations on competition policy issues - made during my mandate as Chief Economist at DG Competition, and more recent.

"Abuse in Digital Markets: Theories of Harm", EARIE Presidential Address, 49th EARIE Annual Conference, University of Vienna (25 August 2022)

"Acquisition of potential competitors: Analysis and Policy", Funcas, Madrid (20 February 2020)

"Challenges for merger control", Inaugural Lecture, Master of Applied Research in Economics and Business, Univ. Autònoma de Barcelona (23 October 2019)

"Abuse of dominance: Exclusionary practices", Awarding ceremony of the XI Premi of Societat Catalana d'Economia to the best book, Barcelona (21 October 2019)

"Why digital markets do not work as they should and what we can do about it", Barcelona GSE Welcome Lecture, Univ Autonoma de Barcelona (September 2019)

"Acquisition of potential competitors", EARIE, Barcelona (August 2019)

"We need more antitrust enforcement", Univ. Adolfo Ibañez, Santiago de Chile (August 2019)

"Rising concentration and market power. The role of competition policy", Annual Lecture, MEF, Naples (July 2018)

"We are too soft on mergers", Keynote Speech, MaCCI Annual Conference, Mannheim (March 2017)

"Competition in the Digital Economy: Big Data and the Sharing Economy", Public Presentation at the Autoridade da Concorrência, Lisbon (February 2017)

"Ex post assessments" (ACM, Amsterdam): Keynote Lecture at a Conference on "Impact Assessment of Interventions of Competition and Consumer Authorities" (November 2016)

"Container Shipping" (Association of Competition Economics, Amsterdam): Discussion of a case involving public announcement of intended prices (November 2016).

"Excessive prices" (Meeting of the Chief Economists of the European Competition Network in Riga): When should a Competition Agency undertake an exploitative abuse case? And what are the tests to find that prices are excessive? (October 2016)

"Política de la competencia en el sector farmacéutico" (Escuela de Salud Pública, Menorca) - in Spanish: on recent competition cases in the pharma sector. (September 2016)

"Economic analysis in competition policy and cases" (Annual Meeting of the International Competition Network, Singapore): A view on how to use economics in both policy and cases, in the light of my experience at the European Commission.(April 2016)

"Sharing economies: Policy issues", with Adina Claici (Bruegel, Brussels). A competition policy view of issues arising in sectors where sharing platforms (such as Uber, Airbnb etc.) are active. (February 2016)

"Cartels, and economics". (Yale University). What is the role of economics in fighting cartels? (With particular attention on how to deal with information exchange agreements.) (February 2016)

"Competition and fairness" (CRA, Brussels). It is often said that competition policy is about fairness. Here I explain that in my view competition policy is indeed consistent with "ex ante fairness", meant as ensuring a level-playing field in which all firms can compete and contest the market. (December 2015)

"Mobile mergers: what have we learned?" (Association of Competition Economists, Milan). The European Commission has recently dealt with a series of mergers in the mobile industry. These mergers have used economic analysis quite intensively, and here I explain the Chief Economist Team's experience with these cases. (November 2015)

"Competition and its effects" (European Association of Law and Economics, Vienna). What are the effects - on prices, investments, growth - of having more compettion in the economy? And what is the role that competition law can have in this respect? (September 2015)

"Abuse of dominance in developing countries" (CRESSE, Crete). Jean-Jacques Laffont argued that developing countries has specific features which should be taken into account when designing regulation. Here I argue that the same should hold for competition policy. (July 2015)

"On deterrence of antitrust infringement" (Concurrences, Brussels). Some facts and thoughts on sanctions in competition policy. (March 2015)

"After Intel: Effects-based approach, the price-cost test, and administrability" (CRA, Brussels). On how to deal with rebates. (December 2014) See on the same topic:

"On the use of price-cost tests in loyalty discounts and exclusive dealing arrangements: Which implications from economic theory?" (with Chiara Fumagalli).

"Competition policy in the digital sector" (Collège d'Europe, Bruges). On the role of competition policy, and recent cases in the digital sector. (Oct 2014)

"The Chief Economist Team" (European Competition Forum, Lake Como). A description of the CET of the European Commission. Its mandate, how it operates etc...(Oct 2014)

"Mergers and national champions" (Concurrences, Brussels) (Jul 2014). Often countries treat mergers involving domestic firms differently. I appeal to economic and political economy arguments to explain it.

"Economics in global antitrust practice. Does economic theory need to adapt to practice?" (Chatham House, London). (Jun 2014)

"Coordinated effects in mergers" (Fordham Meeting of Chief Economists, Florence). (May 2014)

"State Aid evaluation" (multilateral meeting with EU Member States), on how to do ex post assessments of state aid policies (Jan 2014)

" Are we too soft on mergers?" (CRA, Brussels). In a session asking whether EC's merger control was too tough, I argued the opposite... (Dec 2013)