On 11 September 2026, the Supreme People’s Court of China (“SPC”) released a report on six typical anti-monopoly cases, covering such significant legal issues as restricted transactions, discriminatory treatment, and unfair high pricing constituting abuse of market dominance, the identification of horizontal monopoly agreements, and judicial review of anti-monopoly administrative penalties and administrative guidance. The cases involve industries essential to people’s livelihood—including agricultural wholesale, motor vehicle testing, cement, and concrete—as well as producer services sectors such as electroplating wastewater treatment and piped steam supply.
These six typical cases represent the first systematic set of adjudicative rules issued by the SPC in a centralized manner since the first amendment of the Anti-Monopoly Law of the People’s Republic of China (“Anti-Monopoly Law”) in 2022. The six typical cases translate the general provisions of the Anti-Monopoly Law—such as “restricted transactions”, “discriminatory treatment”, and “unfair high pricing”—into operable adjudicative standards, providing market participants with clear behavioral expectations. At the typical case level, they establish a mechanism for the discovery of leads, transfer of jurisdiction, and procedural coordination between civil adjudication and administrative enforcement, responding to the long-standing practical pain point of the lack of an institutional interface between “public enforcement” and “private enforcement” in the anti-monopoly field. Furthermore, they extend the protective reach of anti-monopoly justice to areas directly affecting the interests of small and medium-sized enterprises and consumers—such as “vegetable basket” supply, motor vehicle testing, and industrial park basic services—reflecting the deepening of competition policy from “macro-level maintenance of market order” to “micro-level protection of stakeholder rights”. The release of these typical cases marks China’s anti-monopoly adjudication transitioning comprehensively from a “period of rule system construction” into a “period of precision implementation and normalized application”.
Typical Case One: Tan v. An Agricultural Products Company (Abuse of Market Dominance Dispute), (2024) Xiang 01 Zhi Min Chu No. 607, (2025) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 777 - This case evaluates punitive discriminatory treatment and restricted transactions as an integrated whole, clarifying that freedom of contract cannot serve as a justification for eliminating or restricting competition, and delineating clear boundaries for anti-monopoly enforcement in the circulation sector.
An agricultural products company operates Logistics Park A. In December 2017, Tan moved into Logistics Park A to engage in vegetable wholesale, and the parties signed a 20-year Booth Lease Contract providing that Tan could only operate in Logistics Park A. From June 2023 to February 2024, the agricultural products company, on the grounds that Tan simultaneously operated in Market B, increased Tan’s transaction service fee to three times the original standard and demanded that Tan “choose one of two”. Tan filed suit. The Changsha Intermediate People’s Court of Hunan Province held at first instance that the agricultural products company possessed market dominance in the relevant market, engaged in discriminatory treatment and restricted transactions, and awarded damages of RMB 408,195 (approximately US$ 60,902) for excess transaction service fees, RMB 100,000 (approximately US$ 14,920) for business losses, and RMB 62,000 (approximately US$ 9,250) for attorney’s fees. The SPC affirmed on appeal.
This case refines the factors for defining the relevant market in the agricultural wholesale sector, comprehensively considering the physical characteristics of vegetables—such as short shelf life and high transportation loss—and the regional attributes of local “vegetable basket” project planning, defining the relevant product market as the vegetable wholesale booth leasing services market, providing a reference for market definition in similar livelihood industries. Additionally, the case clarifies that compelling merchants to “choose one of two” through punitive discriminatory treatment constitutes a restricted transaction. The court evaluated the triple fee and the exclusivity clause as integrated means to achieve the purpose of restricted transactions, rather than fragmented as independent discriminatory treatment, providing a unified identification framework for increasingly concealed exclusive dealing arrangements in practice.
Typical Case Two: A Hardware Company v. A Wastewater Treatment Company (Discriminatory Treatment Dispute), (2023) Zhe 03 Zhi Min Chu No. 468, (2024) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 896 - This case establishes the discriminatory treatment review principle that “identity difference does not equal condition difference”, and systematically clarifies the victim’s duty to mitigate losses in anti-monopoly damages, providing judicial protection for small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain basic services on an equal basis.
A wastewater treatment company is the sole electroplating wastewater treatment enterprise in an industrial park in a certain city, and is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Company A. The 57 natural person shareholders of Company A are legal representatives or actual controllers of some electroplating enterprises in the industrial park (“owner-unit enterprises”). In April 2022, a hardware company acquired the factory buildings, equipment, and pollution discharge rights of Company B in the industrial park through auction. In a dispute over wastewater treatment fee standards, the wastewater treatment company charged owner-unit enterprises at RMB 45/ton (approximately US$ 6.7/ton) and demanded the hardware company pay at RMB 65/ton (approximately US$ 9.7/ton). The SPC held on appeal that the wastewater treatment company had market dominance in the electroplating wastewater treatment services market in the industrial park, and that the hardware company and owner-unit enterprises had no substantive differences in core transaction conditions such as discharge volume and pollutant circumstances; setting different fee standards solely on the basis of shareholder identity constituted discriminatory treatment. Regarding damages, the court found that the hardware company had not proven that the discriminatory treatment was the direct cause of its failure to commence operations, and awarded RMB 10,000 (approximately US$ 1,492) in discretionary damages.
This case clarifies the standard for determining “trading parties with identical conditions”—specific identity cannot substitute for proof of substantive differences in transaction conditions, and the defendant bears the burden of proof regarding substantive differences in core transaction conditions such as discharge volume, treatment difficulty, and performance risk. This rule has general guiding significance for the behavioral boundaries of basic service providers in closed markets such as industrial parks and industrial zones. Additionally, this case introduces the victim’s duty to mitigate losses in anti-monopoly damages—where the victim, after court clarification, still failed to prove a direct causal relationship between the monopolistic conduct and its losses, and failed to take reasonable measures to reduce losses, its damages claim was limited. This rule provides important guidance for determining the scope of damages in anti-monopoly civil litigation.
Typical Case Three: Motor Vehicle Testing Company D v. Companies A, B, and C (Monopoly Dispute), (2025) Qian 01 Min Chu No. 1331 - This case pioneers the institutional precedent of civil adjudication proceedings serving as a “discovery mechanism” for anti-monopoly enforcement, achieving coordinated efforts between civil justice and administrative enforcement in anti-monopoly governance through the dual procedural coordination of jurisdiction transfer and transfer of illegal conduct leads.
In February 2023, four motor vehicle testing institutions in a certain county signed a Joint Operation Cooperation Agreement, providing that the four institutions would be integrated into two testing institutions, two would cease operations, the equipment of the ceased institutions could not be sold within the county in any form, and charging standards would be jointly decided by the four institutions. Subsequently, due to a profit distribution dispute, Company D filed suit at the Tongzi County People’s Court of Guizhou Province on the grounds of a partnership contract dispute. The Tongzi County Court, upon review, found that the joint operation cooperation agreement was suspected of monopoly, and ruled to transfer the case to the Guiyang Intermediate People’s Court. The Guiyang Intermediate People’s Court found that the joint operation cooperation agreement constituted a horizontal monopoly agreement; although the parties asserted exemption, they failed to prove that consumers could share the benefits, and the court confirmed the agreement was entirely invalid, dismissed Company D’s claims, and transferred the illegal conduct leads to the market regulation authorities.
This case has prominent procedural significance. On the one hand, it establishes the duty of care of basic-level courts to identify monopoly issues in ordinary civil and commercial dispute adjudication—courts should not be bound by the formal appearance of contract texts, but should carefully review contract terms to identify circumstances that clearly violate the Anti-Monopoly Law. On the other hand, it constructs a three-stage coordination mechanism of “identification—transfer of jurisdiction—transfer of illegal conduct leads”, achieving procedural coordination between civil adjudication and administrative enforcement in the anti-monopoly field.
Typical Case Four: Eight Printing and Dyeing Companies v. An Electric Power Company (Abuse of Market Dominance Dispute), (2022) Zhe 02 Zhi Min Chu No. 284, (2023) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 2862 - This case systematically constructs a “short-term conduct—long-term mechanism” binary review framework, avoiding the inclusion of normal market price fluctuations within the scope of anti-monopoly regulation while establishing three assessment criteria—commercial reasonableness, sufficient transparency, and competitive reasonable price range—for long-term pricing mechanisms, providing clear guidance for pricing compliance in basic service sectors such as energy supply.
An electric power company is the sole heat supplier in the piped steam market within a 10-kilometer radius in a certain area. In November 2021, the electric power company sold piped steam to eight printing and dyeing companies at prices exceeding those of other enterprises in the area, and from January 2022 implemented a new coal-steam linkage pricing formula. The eight printing and dyeing companies sought return of overcharged steam fees and corresponding interest. The Ningbo Intermediate People’s Court of Zhejiang Province dismissed the claims at first instance. The SPC held on appeal that anti-monopoly law regulation of unfair high pricing typically targets operators’ persistent and systematic exploitation of market dominance to obtain profits far exceeding competitive levels; for single, short-term high-price conduct, unless the plaintiff can prove that such conduct directly and clearly produced exclusionary or restrictive effects on competition, or caused significant harm to consumer welfare, it is difficult to characterize the conduct as unfair high pricing prohibited by anti-monopoly law. For long-term pricing mechanisms, the court proposed that the focus should be on assessing whether the pricing mechanism as a whole possesses commercial reasonableness, sufficient transparency, and whether its long-term operation results maintain prices within a reasonable range similar to those formed by market competition. The new coal-steam linkage pricing formula at issue inherited and optimized the original formula, the adjusted and added cost parameters possessed commercial reasonableness, and the operation results showed no significant difference from comparable prices of similar operators; therefore, it did not constitute unfair high pricing.
This case establishes the distinction between short-term price fluctuations and unfair high pricing—positioning unfair high pricing regulated by anti-monopoly law as “persistent, systematic” price exploitation conduct, rather than price anomalies at individual points in time. This distinction helps avoid excessive anti-monopoly intervention in market pricing power and maintains operators’ autonomy in pricing. Additionally, this case constructs an anti-monopoly review framework for long-term pricing mechanisms, with “commercial reasonableness—sufficient transparency—competitive reasonable price range” as three core assessment elements. This framework provides clear compliance guidance for operators with market dominance in public utility sectors (heating, water supply, gas supply, etc.), and provides an operable analytical tool for anti-monopoly enforcement agencies reviewing pricing mechanisms.
Typical Case Five: A Provincial Cement Association v. State Administration for Market Regulation (Anti-monopoly Administrative Reconsideration Case), (2024) Jing 73 Xing Chu No. 9068, (2025) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Xing Zhong No. 849 - This case establishes a justiciability review standard for administrative guidance centered on “whether specific rights and obligations are created”, providing a legitimacy basis for flexible anti-monopoly enforcement and an analytical framework for judicial review of administrative guidance in other fields.
In June 2022, a provincial market regulation bureau imposed an administrative penalty on a provincial cement association for organizing and promoting 13 cement enterprises in the province to reach and implement a horizontal monopoly agreement to uniformly raise cement product prices, and simultaneously issued an administrative guidance letter requiring comprehensive rectification. The cement association believed that the administrative guidance letter created mandatory obligations for it, applied for administrative reconsideration, and after the reconsideration application was rejected, filed an administrative lawsuit. The Beijing Intellectual Property Court dismissed the claims at first instance. The SPC held on appeal that although portions of the administrative guidance letter used wording such as “shall not” and “should” and required periodic submission of self-inspection reports, the content primarily restated matters already clearly provided in the Anti-Monopoly Law and other laws, regulations, and normative documents, and was intended to persuade the cement association and its staff to consciously comply with prohibitive requirements or compliance obligations through reminders, suggestions, and other means, without creating, altering, or extinguishing specific rights and obligations for the cement association. It also did not restrict the cement association’s autonomy of choice, nor did it possess de facto mandatory legal effect. Therefore, the administrative guidance letter constituted an administrative guidance act and fell outside the scope of administrative reconsideration.
This case fills the regulatory gap in justiciability review of anti-monopoly administrative guidance acts. The court proposed a substantive standard for determining whether administrative guidance exceeds its boundaries—namely, reviewing whether the guidance act creates, alters, or extinguishes specific rights and obligations for the counterparty, and whether it restricts the counterparty’s autonomy of choice. The mandatory coloring of wording and the use of expressions such as “shall not” and “should” do not constitute decisive factors in determining the mandatory nature of an administrative act; the key lies in whether the act has de facto mandatory legal effect. Additionally, this case reflects judicial respect for administrative professional judgment and flexible administrative management, maintaining the legitimate space for administrative guidance as a flexible governance tool while supervising the boundaries of administrative enforcement power.
Typical Case Six: A Company v. A Provincial Market Regulation Bureau and State Administration for Market Regulation (Anti-monopoly Administrative Penalty and Administrative Reconsideration Case), (2024) Jing 73 Xing Chu No. 11770, (2025) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Xing Zhong No. 1035 - This case clarifies the boundary for parallel application of criminal fines and administrative fines, clarifies the standard for determining “the same illegal act” and the objective calculation principle for monopoly fine base, providing a reference for procedural coordination between administrative enforcement and criminal justice in the anti-monopoly field.
Some concrete enterprises in a certain area established a “Concrete Association”. Under the proposal and leadership of Kong, the actual controller of a company, and others, 21 local concrete enterprises repeatedly uniformly raised commercial concrete sales prices, implemented management rules such as “quota-based targeted sales” and “high delivery, low subsidy”, and formed a “service team” to exclude out-of-area enterprises through reporting, verbal threats, and obstruction of construction. In November 2020, the company was convicted of the crime of forced transactions and fined RMB 30 million (approximately US$ 4.476 million). In July 2023, a provincial market regulation bureau determined that the company had reached and implemented a monopoly agreement, and imposed a fine of 5% of its 2017 annual sales revenue, amounting to over RMB 27 million (approximately US$ 4.028 million). The company asserted violation of the “no double punishment for the same offense” principle and filed suit. The SPC held on appeal that the crime of forced transactions and horizontal monopoly agreements differ in objective behavioral manifestations, act composition, protected legal interests, and regulatory purposes, and generally do not constitute “the same illegal act”; criminal fines and anti-monopoly administrative fines may be applied in parallel. Regarding the fine base, the harm of horizontal monopolistic conduct to market competition is comprehensive and long-term, and the objective amount should be used as the base for calculating fines, without evaluating and excluding individual transactions.
This case has pioneering significance at the intersection of the Law of the People’s Republic of China on Administrative Penalties (“Administrative Penalties Law”) and the Anti-Monopoly Law. First, it systematically clarifies the standard for determining “the same illegal act”—comprehensively judging from three dimensions: act composition, protected legal interests, and regulatory purposes—delineating the boundary for the scope of application of Article 35 (2) of the Administrative Penalties Law regarding fine offset. Article 35 (2) of the Administrative Penalties Law provides that “where an illegal act constitutes a crime, and the people’s court imposes a fine, and the administrative organ has already imposed a fine on the party, the corresponding amount shall be offset against the fine”—this case actually clarifies that the offset rule presupposes “the same illegal act”, and since the crime of forced transactions and horizontal monopoly agreements are different illegal acts, the offset mechanism is not triggered. Second, this case establishes the objective calculation principle for the fine base—the harm of horizontal monopolistic conduct to market competition is comprehensive and long-term, and cannot be excluded from “the previous year’s sales revenue” merely because an individual transaction may not have been affected by the monopolistic conduct.
Conclusion
The release of the above six typical anti-monopoly cases demonstrates the systematic advancement of China’s anti-monopoly adjudication in three dimensions: rule innovation, procedural coordination, and livelihood protection. At the rule level, Typical Cases One through Four provide refined adjudicative rules for the core institutions of anti-monopoly law from the perspectives of identifying restricted transactions, determining discriminatory treatment, reviewing exemptions for horizontal monopoly agreements, and reviewing standards for unfair high pricing. At the procedural level, Typical Cases Three, Five, and Six respectively resolve three major procedural challenges—the transfer of leads between civil adjudication and administrative enforcement, the justiciability boundary of administrative guidance acts, and the parallel application of criminal fines and administrative fines—constructing a multi-governance, procedurally integrated anti-monopoly governance framework. At the livelihood protection level, the six typical cases cover key areas such as “vegetable basket” supply, motor vehicle testing, and industrial basic services, effectively safeguarding the rights of small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain basic services on an equal basis and to participate fairly in market competition.
These six typical cases represent the first systematic set of adjudicative rules issued by the SPC in a centralized manner since the first amendment of the Anti-Monopoly Law of the People’s Republic of China (“Anti-Monopoly Law”) in 2022. The six typical cases translate the general provisions of the Anti-Monopoly Law—such as “restricted transactions”, “discriminatory treatment”, and “unfair high pricing”—into operable adjudicative standards, providing market participants with clear behavioral expectations. At the typical case level, they establish a mechanism for the discovery of leads, transfer of jurisdiction, and procedural coordination between civil adjudication and administrative enforcement, responding to the long-standing practical pain point of the lack of an institutional interface between “public enforcement” and “private enforcement” in the anti-monopoly field. Furthermore, they extend the protective reach of anti-monopoly justice to areas directly affecting the interests of small and medium-sized enterprises and consumers—such as “vegetable basket” supply, motor vehicle testing, and industrial park basic services—reflecting the deepening of competition policy from “macro-level maintenance of market order” to “micro-level protection of stakeholder rights”. The release of these typical cases marks China’s anti-monopoly adjudication transitioning comprehensively from a “period of rule system construction” into a “period of precision implementation and normalized application”.
Typical Case One: Tan v. An Agricultural Products Company (Abuse of Market Dominance Dispute), (2024) Xiang 01 Zhi Min Chu No. 607, (2025) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 777 - This case evaluates punitive discriminatory treatment and restricted transactions as an integrated whole, clarifying that freedom of contract cannot serve as a justification for eliminating or restricting competition, and delineating clear boundaries for anti-monopoly enforcement in the circulation sector.
An agricultural products company operates Logistics Park A. In December 2017, Tan moved into Logistics Park A to engage in vegetable wholesale, and the parties signed a 20-year Booth Lease Contract providing that Tan could only operate in Logistics Park A. From June 2023 to February 2024, the agricultural products company, on the grounds that Tan simultaneously operated in Market B, increased Tan’s transaction service fee to three times the original standard and demanded that Tan “choose one of two”. Tan filed suit. The Changsha Intermediate People’s Court of Hunan Province held at first instance that the agricultural products company possessed market dominance in the relevant market, engaged in discriminatory treatment and restricted transactions, and awarded damages of RMB 408,195 (approximately US$ 60,902) for excess transaction service fees, RMB 100,000 (approximately US$ 14,920) for business losses, and RMB 62,000 (approximately US$ 9,250) for attorney’s fees. The SPC affirmed on appeal.
This case refines the factors for defining the relevant market in the agricultural wholesale sector, comprehensively considering the physical characteristics of vegetables—such as short shelf life and high transportation loss—and the regional attributes of local “vegetable basket” project planning, defining the relevant product market as the vegetable wholesale booth leasing services market, providing a reference for market definition in similar livelihood industries. Additionally, the case clarifies that compelling merchants to “choose one of two” through punitive discriminatory treatment constitutes a restricted transaction. The court evaluated the triple fee and the exclusivity clause as integrated means to achieve the purpose of restricted transactions, rather than fragmented as independent discriminatory treatment, providing a unified identification framework for increasingly concealed exclusive dealing arrangements in practice.
Typical Case Two: A Hardware Company v. A Wastewater Treatment Company (Discriminatory Treatment Dispute), (2023) Zhe 03 Zhi Min Chu No. 468, (2024) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 896 - This case establishes the discriminatory treatment review principle that “identity difference does not equal condition difference”, and systematically clarifies the victim’s duty to mitigate losses in anti-monopoly damages, providing judicial protection for small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain basic services on an equal basis.
A wastewater treatment company is the sole electroplating wastewater treatment enterprise in an industrial park in a certain city, and is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Company A. The 57 natural person shareholders of Company A are legal representatives or actual controllers of some electroplating enterprises in the industrial park (“owner-unit enterprises”). In April 2022, a hardware company acquired the factory buildings, equipment, and pollution discharge rights of Company B in the industrial park through auction. In a dispute over wastewater treatment fee standards, the wastewater treatment company charged owner-unit enterprises at RMB 45/ton (approximately US$ 6.7/ton) and demanded the hardware company pay at RMB 65/ton (approximately US$ 9.7/ton). The SPC held on appeal that the wastewater treatment company had market dominance in the electroplating wastewater treatment services market in the industrial park, and that the hardware company and owner-unit enterprises had no substantive differences in core transaction conditions such as discharge volume and pollutant circumstances; setting different fee standards solely on the basis of shareholder identity constituted discriminatory treatment. Regarding damages, the court found that the hardware company had not proven that the discriminatory treatment was the direct cause of its failure to commence operations, and awarded RMB 10,000 (approximately US$ 1,492) in discretionary damages.
This case clarifies the standard for determining “trading parties with identical conditions”—specific identity cannot substitute for proof of substantive differences in transaction conditions, and the defendant bears the burden of proof regarding substantive differences in core transaction conditions such as discharge volume, treatment difficulty, and performance risk. This rule has general guiding significance for the behavioral boundaries of basic service providers in closed markets such as industrial parks and industrial zones. Additionally, this case introduces the victim’s duty to mitigate losses in anti-monopoly damages—where the victim, after court clarification, still failed to prove a direct causal relationship between the monopolistic conduct and its losses, and failed to take reasonable measures to reduce losses, its damages claim was limited. This rule provides important guidance for determining the scope of damages in anti-monopoly civil litigation.
Typical Case Three: Motor Vehicle Testing Company D v. Companies A, B, and C (Monopoly Dispute), (2025) Qian 01 Min Chu No. 1331 - This case pioneers the institutional precedent of civil adjudication proceedings serving as a “discovery mechanism” for anti-monopoly enforcement, achieving coordinated efforts between civil justice and administrative enforcement in anti-monopoly governance through the dual procedural coordination of jurisdiction transfer and transfer of illegal conduct leads.
In February 2023, four motor vehicle testing institutions in a certain county signed a Joint Operation Cooperation Agreement, providing that the four institutions would be integrated into two testing institutions, two would cease operations, the equipment of the ceased institutions could not be sold within the county in any form, and charging standards would be jointly decided by the four institutions. Subsequently, due to a profit distribution dispute, Company D filed suit at the Tongzi County People’s Court of Guizhou Province on the grounds of a partnership contract dispute. The Tongzi County Court, upon review, found that the joint operation cooperation agreement was suspected of monopoly, and ruled to transfer the case to the Guiyang Intermediate People’s Court. The Guiyang Intermediate People’s Court found that the joint operation cooperation agreement constituted a horizontal monopoly agreement; although the parties asserted exemption, they failed to prove that consumers could share the benefits, and the court confirmed the agreement was entirely invalid, dismissed Company D’s claims, and transferred the illegal conduct leads to the market regulation authorities.
This case has prominent procedural significance. On the one hand, it establishes the duty of care of basic-level courts to identify monopoly issues in ordinary civil and commercial dispute adjudication—courts should not be bound by the formal appearance of contract texts, but should carefully review contract terms to identify circumstances that clearly violate the Anti-Monopoly Law. On the other hand, it constructs a three-stage coordination mechanism of “identification—transfer of jurisdiction—transfer of illegal conduct leads”, achieving procedural coordination between civil adjudication and administrative enforcement in the anti-monopoly field.
Typical Case Four: Eight Printing and Dyeing Companies v. An Electric Power Company (Abuse of Market Dominance Dispute), (2022) Zhe 02 Zhi Min Chu No. 284, (2023) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 2862 - This case systematically constructs a “short-term conduct—long-term mechanism” binary review framework, avoiding the inclusion of normal market price fluctuations within the scope of anti-monopoly regulation while establishing three assessment criteria—commercial reasonableness, sufficient transparency, and competitive reasonable price range—for long-term pricing mechanisms, providing clear guidance for pricing compliance in basic service sectors such as energy supply.
An electric power company is the sole heat supplier in the piped steam market within a 10-kilometer radius in a certain area. In November 2021, the electric power company sold piped steam to eight printing and dyeing companies at prices exceeding those of other enterprises in the area, and from January 2022 implemented a new coal-steam linkage pricing formula. The eight printing and dyeing companies sought return of overcharged steam fees and corresponding interest. The Ningbo Intermediate People’s Court of Zhejiang Province dismissed the claims at first instance. The SPC held on appeal that anti-monopoly law regulation of unfair high pricing typically targets operators’ persistent and systematic exploitation of market dominance to obtain profits far exceeding competitive levels; for single, short-term high-price conduct, unless the plaintiff can prove that such conduct directly and clearly produced exclusionary or restrictive effects on competition, or caused significant harm to consumer welfare, it is difficult to characterize the conduct as unfair high pricing prohibited by anti-monopoly law. For long-term pricing mechanisms, the court proposed that the focus should be on assessing whether the pricing mechanism as a whole possesses commercial reasonableness, sufficient transparency, and whether its long-term operation results maintain prices within a reasonable range similar to those formed by market competition. The new coal-steam linkage pricing formula at issue inherited and optimized the original formula, the adjusted and added cost parameters possessed commercial reasonableness, and the operation results showed no significant difference from comparable prices of similar operators; therefore, it did not constitute unfair high pricing.
This case establishes the distinction between short-term price fluctuations and unfair high pricing—positioning unfair high pricing regulated by anti-monopoly law as “persistent, systematic” price exploitation conduct, rather than price anomalies at individual points in time. This distinction helps avoid excessive anti-monopoly intervention in market pricing power and maintains operators’ autonomy in pricing. Additionally, this case constructs an anti-monopoly review framework for long-term pricing mechanisms, with “commercial reasonableness—sufficient transparency—competitive reasonable price range” as three core assessment elements. This framework provides clear compliance guidance for operators with market dominance in public utility sectors (heating, water supply, gas supply, etc.), and provides an operable analytical tool for anti-monopoly enforcement agencies reviewing pricing mechanisms.
Typical Case Five: A Provincial Cement Association v. State Administration for Market Regulation (Anti-monopoly Administrative Reconsideration Case), (2024) Jing 73 Xing Chu No. 9068, (2025) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Xing Zhong No. 849 - This case establishes a justiciability review standard for administrative guidance centered on “whether specific rights and obligations are created”, providing a legitimacy basis for flexible anti-monopoly enforcement and an analytical framework for judicial review of administrative guidance in other fields.
In June 2022, a provincial market regulation bureau imposed an administrative penalty on a provincial cement association for organizing and promoting 13 cement enterprises in the province to reach and implement a horizontal monopoly agreement to uniformly raise cement product prices, and simultaneously issued an administrative guidance letter requiring comprehensive rectification. The cement association believed that the administrative guidance letter created mandatory obligations for it, applied for administrative reconsideration, and after the reconsideration application was rejected, filed an administrative lawsuit. The Beijing Intellectual Property Court dismissed the claims at first instance. The SPC held on appeal that although portions of the administrative guidance letter used wording such as “shall not” and “should” and required periodic submission of self-inspection reports, the content primarily restated matters already clearly provided in the Anti-Monopoly Law and other laws, regulations, and normative documents, and was intended to persuade the cement association and its staff to consciously comply with prohibitive requirements or compliance obligations through reminders, suggestions, and other means, without creating, altering, or extinguishing specific rights and obligations for the cement association. It also did not restrict the cement association’s autonomy of choice, nor did it possess de facto mandatory legal effect. Therefore, the administrative guidance letter constituted an administrative guidance act and fell outside the scope of administrative reconsideration.
This case fills the regulatory gap in justiciability review of anti-monopoly administrative guidance acts. The court proposed a substantive standard for determining whether administrative guidance exceeds its boundaries—namely, reviewing whether the guidance act creates, alters, or extinguishes specific rights and obligations for the counterparty, and whether it restricts the counterparty’s autonomy of choice. The mandatory coloring of wording and the use of expressions such as “shall not” and “should” do not constitute decisive factors in determining the mandatory nature of an administrative act; the key lies in whether the act has de facto mandatory legal effect. Additionally, this case reflects judicial respect for administrative professional judgment and flexible administrative management, maintaining the legitimate space for administrative guidance as a flexible governance tool while supervising the boundaries of administrative enforcement power.
Typical Case Six: A Company v. A Provincial Market Regulation Bureau and State Administration for Market Regulation (Anti-monopoly Administrative Penalty and Administrative Reconsideration Case), (2024) Jing 73 Xing Chu No. 11770, (2025) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Xing Zhong No. 1035 - This case clarifies the boundary for parallel application of criminal fines and administrative fines, clarifies the standard for determining “the same illegal act” and the objective calculation principle for monopoly fine base, providing a reference for procedural coordination between administrative enforcement and criminal justice in the anti-monopoly field.
Some concrete enterprises in a certain area established a “Concrete Association”. Under the proposal and leadership of Kong, the actual controller of a company, and others, 21 local concrete enterprises repeatedly uniformly raised commercial concrete sales prices, implemented management rules such as “quota-based targeted sales” and “high delivery, low subsidy”, and formed a “service team” to exclude out-of-area enterprises through reporting, verbal threats, and obstruction of construction. In November 2020, the company was convicted of the crime of forced transactions and fined RMB 30 million (approximately US$ 4.476 million). In July 2023, a provincial market regulation bureau determined that the company had reached and implemented a monopoly agreement, and imposed a fine of 5% of its 2017 annual sales revenue, amounting to over RMB 27 million (approximately US$ 4.028 million). The company asserted violation of the “no double punishment for the same offense” principle and filed suit. The SPC held on appeal that the crime of forced transactions and horizontal monopoly agreements differ in objective behavioral manifestations, act composition, protected legal interests, and regulatory purposes, and generally do not constitute “the same illegal act”; criminal fines and anti-monopoly administrative fines may be applied in parallel. Regarding the fine base, the harm of horizontal monopolistic conduct to market competition is comprehensive and long-term, and the objective amount should be used as the base for calculating fines, without evaluating and excluding individual transactions.
This case has pioneering significance at the intersection of the Law of the People’s Republic of China on Administrative Penalties (“Administrative Penalties Law”) and the Anti-Monopoly Law. First, it systematically clarifies the standard for determining “the same illegal act”—comprehensively judging from three dimensions: act composition, protected legal interests, and regulatory purposes—delineating the boundary for the scope of application of Article 35 (2) of the Administrative Penalties Law regarding fine offset. Article 35 (2) of the Administrative Penalties Law provides that “where an illegal act constitutes a crime, and the people’s court imposes a fine, and the administrative organ has already imposed a fine on the party, the corresponding amount shall be offset against the fine”—this case actually clarifies that the offset rule presupposes “the same illegal act”, and since the crime of forced transactions and horizontal monopoly agreements are different illegal acts, the offset mechanism is not triggered. Second, this case establishes the objective calculation principle for the fine base—the harm of horizontal monopolistic conduct to market competition is comprehensive and long-term, and cannot be excluded from “the previous year’s sales revenue” merely because an individual transaction may not have been affected by the monopolistic conduct.
Conclusion
The release of the above six typical anti-monopoly cases demonstrates the systematic advancement of China’s anti-monopoly adjudication in three dimensions: rule innovation, procedural coordination, and livelihood protection. At the rule level, Typical Cases One through Four provide refined adjudicative rules for the core institutions of anti-monopoly law from the perspectives of identifying restricted transactions, determining discriminatory treatment, reviewing exemptions for horizontal monopoly agreements, and reviewing standards for unfair high pricing. At the procedural level, Typical Cases Three, Five, and Six respectively resolve three major procedural challenges—the transfer of leads between civil adjudication and administrative enforcement, the justiciability boundary of administrative guidance acts, and the parallel application of criminal fines and administrative fines—constructing a multi-governance, procedurally integrated anti-monopoly governance framework. At the livelihood protection level, the six typical cases cover key areas such as “vegetable basket” supply, motor vehicle testing, and industrial basic services, effectively safeguarding the rights of small and medium-sized enterprises to obtain basic services on an equal basis and to participate fairly in market competition.