Antitrust

5 8 Nevertheless, the EC has not yet repeated its parallel approach to hybrid cases since its first ever hybrid case in Animal Feed Phosphates — in this case, both the EC's settlement and standard infringement decisions were adopted on July 20, 2010. 14 In its most recent judgment in Pometon, the General Court provided a sturdy defense of staggered hybrid cases. Moreover, in the EC's first hybrid case since Pometon (Forex), regarding alleged cartels in the foreign exchange market implemented via trader chatrooms, the EC's procedural practice appears to have the characteristics of a staggered procedure. The EC has adopted two settlement decisions in relation to two chatrooms whilst continuing "other ongoing procedures" in the same Forex case. 15 By concluding its settlement procedures in advance of other proceedings, the Forex case may be interpreted as the EC resurrecting the staggered hybrid procedure notwithstanding the criticisms of the procedure in the General Court's ICAP judgment. Staggered hybrid procedures are therefore the likely future direction of EC practice given the significant benefits provided by the flexibility of staggered hybrid procedures both to EC enforcement and to parties considering settlement. THE IMPLICATIONS OF THE EC'S FUTURE PROCEDURAL PRACTICE IN HYBRID CASES One of the principal reasons behind the introduction of the settlement procedure was to allow the EC to swiftly conclude cases in order to free up its resources to take on additional cases. Hybrid cases run in parallel, however, may lead to a loss of the procedural efficiencies of settlement. Even if just one party drops CARTELS 10 T H E F O R E X C A S E M AY B E I N T E R P R E T E D A S T H E E C R E S U R R E C T I N G T H E S TA G G E R E D H Y B R I D P R O C E D U R E N O T W I T H S TA N D I N G T H E C R I T I C I S M S O F T H E P R O C E D U R E I N THE GENERAL COURT'S I C A P J U D G M E N T Recent Developments in Hybrid Settlement Cases

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