Price Fixing in Korea: Will FTA’s Lower Consumer Prices in Korea?

As booze and babies illustrate in today’s newspapers, the consumer price impacts by the EU & US FTAs may have been blown way out of proportions by both proponents and opponents of these trade treaties. The big price inflators are, normally, not duties but distribution costs and sometimes excise taxes. In time, some of the new import price savings resulting from tariff reductions may be passed on to consumers as more importers and distributors provide Korean consumers with foreign goods.

Continue reading

Korean Price-Fixing Law: Defining the Relevant Market in Korea Antitrust Law

The Seoul High Court (2009 NU 1930, May 19, 2010) has overruled a decision of the Korean Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) in a case concerning price-fixing by luxury car importers. The KFTC has appealed the this pivotal price-fixing case.  We shall update the reader. The High Court ruled that a price-fixing arrangement (restriction on discounts from MSRP) between Lexus car dealers was not an “unfair collective act” under Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Act Art. 19 (1) thus overruling the

Continue reading