The Foreign Investors Council presented the White Book 2019, a publication published yearly that provides an overview of the business environment, in addition to recommendations for its improvement from the investors’ perspective.

Foreign investors this year also remarked the significant progress achieved in the work of the Commission for Protection of Competition, in addition to the increased scope of the Commission’s activities in various fields of its competence, as well as its readiness to use complex mechanisms provided for by the Law.

The document commended the Commission’s efforts to more intensely use advanced economic analysis in inquiries into competition infringements and complex mergers, as well as its advance use of new econometric software to increase the quality of economic analysis in cases before the Commission.

This year’s White Book also states: “In 2018, the Commission continued making progress in competition advocacy and public relations. The Commission regularly informs the public on its activities and publishes a great majority of its decisions on its official website. However, it is noticeable that the Commission does not publish all the decisions in relevant areas or that it publishes them with significant delays, which does not contribute to either transparency or legal certainty. The Commission published on its website the Guidelines on Rights and Obligations of the Parties during Dawn Raids, as well as the Leniency Policy Leaflet. This positive development concerning competition advocacy is important as it contributes to the overall improvement of the current legal framework and to better understanding on the part of the general public and the media of competition rules and activities and the importance of the Commission’s role.”

The investors’ reiterated recommendations to the Commission are to proceed with the adoption of regulations governing particular categories of key importance for the completion of the competition regulatory framework, issue publications of the relevant definitions of product markets, and produce clear guidelines and instructions containing the manner of application of certain provisions of the Law, aimed at increasing the transparency and legal certainty.