ARE MERGERS THEORIES OF HARM PREDICTIVE OF SUBSEQUENT INVESTIGATIONS IN THE CONTROL OF UNILATERAL CONDUCTS? An analysis of the relationship between the two forms of investigation of the antitrust authority based on CADE's jurisprudence under Law 12.529/2011
mergers, unilateral conducts, Cade, competition
The purpose of this research is to address the predictive possibility of theories of harm analyzed in the context of merger acts, when compared to the control of unilateral conducts by the Administrative Council for Economic Defense (CADE) during the term of Law 12.529/2012. After an extensive jurisprudential analysis that included more than 400 cases analyzed (between mergers and unilateral conduct investigation processes), argumentative categories were created so that the comparison between the two types of proceedings was possible. Among the main results, it can be stated that CADE still has a long way to go in the use of information, which it already has when evaluating economic concentrations, in terms of conducts. Even so, it was possible to determine that there were seven scenarios in which the conduct proceedings were opened as a result of the merger cases. In two of them, the companies were convicted, demonstrating the authority's predictive inability even when, during the investigation of the merger, relevant risks to competition were identified.