§6.3.1 Methods and information needed

(147) In general, the decrease in volume, illustrated by the decrease in sales from q 1 to q 2 in Box 11 above, will be affected by a firm's own price increase as well as changes in the prices of the competitors, given that firms compete on prices. Hence, the magnitude of the loss in volume will require an assessment of how the passing-on has affected prices of all competitors in the market, as well as the sensitivity of demand to those price changes. When assessing this method, the volume effect (110) is estimated by multiplying the volume loss by the counterfactual margin. (148) The data requirements when estimating the volume effect by reference to the elasticity approach will depend on whether the relevant firms are equally affected by the overcharge, i.e. whether it is an industry-wide overcharge. The volume effects of both the own-price and the cross-price elasticity could be captured by the market price elasticity. Under such circumstances the volume effect may be estimated based on the counterfactual margin, the market elasticity of demand and observed prices (p 1) and quantities (q 2). (149) The counterfactual margin may be estimated by employing the comparator-based approach as well. A quantitative estimation of the market elasticity of demand may require a vast amount of data on prices and quantities, which may not be available or proportionate in a specific case. Under such circumstances, the court may find it sufficient to use other sources of evidence, for instance information in previous market studies of the relevant market or internal documents providing information on the relevant elasticity (111). (150) Another simplified approach may be to use insights from economic theory to estimate the volume effect. Such an approach may be based on the price set by the direct purchaser during the infringement period (the passing-on related price effect) and the counterfactual volume. Since a firm's ability to raise prices depends on how price sensitive the demand for its product is, an inverse relationship is normally predicted between a firm's margin and the own-price elasticity of demand. Drawing on this, the own-price elasticity and the counterfactual margin can be ‘cancelled out’. Since information on the price set by the direct purchaser (the passing-on related price effect) will already be available at this stage of a case, the only additional input required in order to estimate the volume effect is the counterfactual volume.

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Source: EUR-Lex (Cellar) · retrieved 2026-09-07