The Tribunal de Defensa de la Libre Competencia (TDLC) approved today the Conciliatory Agreement subscribed between the Fiscalía Nacional Económica (FNE), Minerva S.A. (Minerva) and JBS S.A. (JBS), corporations that participate in the markets of production, processing and commercialization of carnic products abroad, and that operate in Chile through Minerva Foods Chile SpA and JBS Chile Limited, respectively.
This agreement brings to an end the proceedings brought by the FNE on April 6th 2018 against Minerva and JBS for having infringed the legal prohibition of closing an operation notified to the FNE before receiving due authorization by this entity. The National Economic Prosecutor, Felipe Irarrázabal Philippi, valued the agreement reached with the parties and highlighted that “companies have to respect the merger and acquisition control system. The FNE will demand compliance with this system and will ask for penalties and measures whenever it becomes necessary because gun jumping infractions are serious”.
The operation between Minerva and JBS, approved unconditionally under the Chilean competition law, consisted of the acquisition by some companies related to Minerva of all the shares of four JBS’s subsidiaries located in Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. According to the complaint brought by FNE, the infringement gave Minerva the opportunity to exercise a decisive influence on the administration of JBS’s subsidiaries acquired by the former, in their relations with JBS Chile Limited and the Chilean market. The FNE argued that the existence of a carve-out agreement did not change this reality.
In his resolution, the TDLC stated that Minerva and JBS recognized in the settlement that after they notified the proposed acquisition in Chile they proceeded to close the operation abroad, before of getting the administrative authorization. At the same time, the TDLC announced that both companies assumed the obligation of paying the unique amount of US$1.000.000 approximately.