The Spanish Government adopts legislation to comply with the EU Court of Justice judgement on sales at a loss (Europamur)

The Spanish Government has amended the Spanish Retail Commerce Act (“SRCA”) [1] in order to comply with the European Court of Justice’s (“ECJ”) Europamur judgement on sales at a loss, by issuing Royal Decree-Act 20/2018, of 7 December (the “Royal Decree”) [2]. According to the ECJ, the illegality of this practice will henceforth depend exclusively on the unfair nature of the conduct, pursuant to the Spanish Unfair Competition Act (“SUCA”) [3] and the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (“the Directive”). [4] I. Introduction and facts The previous wording of Article 14 (1) of the SRCA established a general ban on sales at a loss (with the exception of (i) clearance sales, (ii) close-out sales, (iii) sales of soon-to-expire perishable goods and (iv) situations where the objective of