EU court upholds synthetic rubber cartel fine on Dow, Shell

摘要

London — The General Court of the European Union hasupheld the antitrust fine it imposed on Dow Chemical Coand the Royal Dutch Shell Group for their participation in asynthetic rubber cartel, a court statement said Wednesday.The EU in 2006 fined Shell Eur160.9 million ($226 million)and Dow Eur64.6 million for their involvement in a cartelon the market for butadiene and emulsion styrene butadienerubber, used mainly in tire production, between 1996 and2002. The court reduced the fine on Italian oil group Eniand its petrochemicals unit Polimeri to Eur181.5 millionfrom Eur272.2 million. It also annulled the Eur17.5 millionfine on Czech petrochemicals group Unipetrol and its unitKaucuk, and the Eur3.8 million penalty imposed on Poland'sTrade-Stomil.