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05.01.2026

Tax & Financial Standards New Judgments of the ECJ For December 2025

Tax & Financial Standards New Judgments of the ECJ For December 2025

December

С-121/24 of 11 December 2025

Value added tax  — Joint and several liability — Insolvency of the principal debtor — Continued obligation to pay VAT — Joint and several liability of a third party after the removal of the principal debtor from the commercial register — Principle of legal certainty — Principle of proportionality

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

Joint and several liability of a third party for the VAT debts of a person liable for payment of that VAT (a company) where that person no longer exists, and where the liability of that third party was not prescribed until after that company’s liquidation. The principles of proportionality and legal certainty, allowing national legislation, under which the person held jointly and severally liable for payment of VAT may incur liability after the person liable for payment of that tax has ceased to exist as a legal person.
Proceedings, concerning the joint and several liability of a company for the payment of value added tax.

С-767/24 of 11 December 2025

Consumer protection — Effects of a term being found to be unfair — Contract declared void — Action brought by a seller or supplier seeking restitution of the amount of the loan paid under a contract which is to be annulled — Implied waiver of the objection that the action is time-barred — Principle of effectiveness — Dissuasive effect of the prohibition on unfair terms

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

Unfair terms in consumer contracts. An annulment in its entirety of a mortgage loan agreement concluded between a consumer and a banking institution, on the ground that that agreement contains an unfair term. A national case-law according to which the submission by that consumer of a declaration of set-off of his or her claim against that of that banking institution entails an implied waiver of the objection that the claim relied on by that institution is time-barred.
Proceedings, concerning an action seeking restitution in respect of a debt resulting from the use of a sum of money lent under a mortgage loan agreement, which had to be annulled on the ground that it contains unfair terms.

С-796/23 of 11 December 2025

Value added tax — Partners in a civil law partnership devoid of legal personality — Determination of the taxable person liable to pay VAT — Concept of ‘taxable person’

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

Allocation of turnover to a taxable person. National legislation which provides that one of the partners in a civil law partnership devoid of legal personality separate from that of its partners and providing taxable services – referred to as the ‘designated partner’ – is to be deemed to be the person liable to pay VAT in respect of taxable services provided by the other partners in that partnership.
Concept of „taxable person “.
Proceedings, concerning an order that company pay amounts due in respect of value added tax and a penalty, on the ground that it was liable to pay that tax as a ‘designated partner’ for services provided to customers established in that Member State by undertakings with which it had cooperated and which were part of the same ‘partnership’ with it, within the meaning of Czech civil law.

С-161/24 of 18 December 2025

Competition — Abuse of dominant position — Collective management organisation handling copyright — Rates for royalties for the provision of a licence to make copyrighted works available — Calculation method — Failure to take into account the rate of occupancy of rooms — Unfair prices

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

Dominant position. Rates for the provision of a licence to make copyrighted works available. Unfair trading conditions. Excessive prices. The finding of abuse of a dominant position is substantiated to the requisite legal standard where it is established that the practice concerned is capable of impairing an effective competition structure, without it being necessary to prove that that practice may also cause direct harm to consumers.
Proceedings between O, a collective management organisation, and Office for the Protection of Competition concerning a decision by which that authority penalised O for an infringement of Article 102 TFEU.

С-245/24 of 18 December 2025

Competition — Abuse of a dominant position — Market for the storage of automotive fuels — Abuse — Refusal of access to essential infrastructure for third-party undertakings — Infrastructure financed by public funds — Privatisation of that infrastructure

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

For a competition authority to be able to find that the conduct of companies belonging to the same dominant undertaking, consisting, according to that authority, in refusing to grant access to facilities, constitutes an abuse of that dominant position, that authority is not required to establish that the conditions of Article 102 TFEU are satisfied if the authority is able to establish that those conditions are satisfied with regard to the overall abusive conduct for which that undertaking is criticised.. Refusal to grant access to an essential facility. Privatisation. Concession.
Proceedings, concerning the validity of decision, by which the Bulgarian competition authority found that companies had abused their dominant position on the market for the storage of automotive fuels in Bulgaria, which is prohibited by both Article 102 TFEU and the corresponding provisions of the law of that Member State.

С-260/24 of 18 December 2025

Competition — Abuse of a dominant position — Wholesale market for fuel — Margin squeeze on competitors — Product market definition — Vertically divided market — Taking into account the excise duty regime — Concept of „relevant market“

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

In order to find the existence of an abusive practice of margin squeeze committed by a vertically integrated undertaking, a competition authority must establish, the existence of a dominant position on the part of that undertaking on the upstream market and the existence on a downstream market linked to the upstream market, of a price, applied by the vertically integrated undertaking, which is capable of leading to an exclusionary effect on its competitors. Only products which have a sufficient degree of substitutability may be included in the same market for the purposes of assessing the existence of a dominant position. Concept of „relevant market “
Proceedings between L and the Bulgarian competition authority’ concerning the validity of Decision, by which the latter found that that company had committed an abuse of a dominant position.

November

С-509/24 of 27 November 2025

Unfair terms in consumer contracts – Contract concerning a bank account – Order for payment procedure – Review of the court’s own motion of whether contractual terms are unfair – Proposal by the court to reduce the claim by the amount corresponding to the application of a term considered to be unfair – Acceptance by the seller or supplier and possibility to claim that amount in subsequent proceedings – Principle of effectiveness – Participation of the consumer in the review of whether a contractual term is unfair

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

Means to prevent the continued use of unfair terms in contracts. National legislation which provides, first, that a court hearing an application by a seller for an order for payment against a consumer may make a proposal for a reduction in the amount of the claim, and second, that seller, after accepting that proposal, has the possibility of bringing other legal proceedings. National legislation which does not provide for the consumer to participate in the review, by the court hearing an application for an order for payment, of the possible unfairness of the contractual terms on which that application is based.
Proceedings brought by the assignee of a claim relating to a contract for the opening of a current bank account in, a consumer, seeking the issue of an order for payment of a pecuniary debt arising from that contract.

С-567/24 of 27 November 2025

Company law — Mandatory takeover bid — Squeeze-out of holders of securities — Minority shareholder protection — Consideration offered in the bid presumed to be fair — Rebuttable presumption

Key aspects of the decision in the economic range:

Freedom of establishmen. The aim of ensuring transparency and legal certainty in takeover bids. Protection of minority shareholders. The mandatory bid and the equitable price. The right of squeeze-out. The presumption established in that provision, according to which the consideration offered in a mandatory takeover bid of a company’s securities is fair. The circumstances provided to the attention of the supervisory authority of Member State, with a view to adjusting the price offered in the preliminary mandatory takeover bid.
Proceedings concerning the determination of the financial compensation to be paid to the minority shareholders of the company HR for the sale of their securities, in a mandatory takeover bid.