The State Agency for Antimonopoly and Consumer Market Control under the President has initiated a case against “PDD Holdings”, the owner of the “Temu” e-commerce platform.
Modern.az reports with reference to FED.az that “PDD Holdings” company violated competition legislation by abusing its dominant position by implementing a price policy that restricts competition through the “Temu” e-commerce platform.
The Agency announced that these actions constitute a violation of the requirements of Articles 16.2.1, 16.2.7 and 16.2.8 of the Competition Code.
“The investigation initiated by the competition authority on its own initiative based on the received application is ongoing,” the State Agency for Antimonopoly and Consumer Market Control stated.
So, which violations do Articles 16.2.1, 16.2.7 and 16.2.8 of the Competition Code, reminded by the State Agency for Antimonopoly and Consumer Market Control, refer to?
In general, Article 16 of the Code refers to abuse of dominant position (Article 16. Abuse of dominant position)
Article 16.2 covers cases of abuse of dominant position that cause or may cause restriction of competition.
As for specific articles:
Article 16.2.1 – provides for the application of low or high monopoly prices.
Article 16.2.7 - refers to the application of low prices that result in the restriction of competition in the market, or prices that do not allow competitors to operate profitably on a continuous basis.
Article 16.2.8 - refers to the sale of a product below its cost price without economic or technological grounds. If these goods are not physically and morally obsolete, and are not goods withdrawn from use.
In other words, the State Agency for Antimonopoly and Consumer Market Control accuses the “Temu” e-commerce platform and its owner “PDD Holdings” of selling goods cheaply, thereby creating problems for competitors in the market.
It should be noted that the low price of goods purchased from foreign internet trading portals often becomes a subject of discussion in Azerbaijan. In particular, local companies selling analogous goods constantly propose to take these platforms under control and impose taxes or restrictions on purchases and sales there.
Currently, the investigation in this regard is ongoing.
