Instituciones financieras y derecho de la competencia en el contexto actual de crisis (I). El régimen de ayudas de Estado

Abstract

The current financial crisis is a challenge for the European legal order given that there is a clear tension between the measures adopted by the Member States to deal with the crisis and the Competition law rules of the EC Treaty, in particular, with those relating to State aid. The Commission has firmly stated that the public aid regime of the European Community is not part of the problem, but part of the solution to the crisis. This is why it has adopted a new framework in which it has determined the legal basis on which the compatibility with the common market of the measures adopted in favour of financial institutions must be evaluated –in particular, article 87(3)(b) of the EC Treaty– as well as the principles that should guide the concession of public aids in order to minimize any negative effects on competition. This article aims to set out the new framework published by the Commission in its various communications and to analyze how this framework is being applied to the measures adopted by the States. The underlying thesis is that, given the absence of a concrete legal basis that would allow EC institutions to intervene directly in favour of financial institutions with the context of the current crisis, the State aids regime has become the main vehicle permitting the Commission to coordinate the action of the States according to the standards that it has itself established.