Latvia's Competition Council: 8 serious violations resolved in 2026, fines top €8.5 million

Latvia's competition watchdog, the Competition Council, had by the end of the third quarter of 2026 uncovered and resolved 8 high-priority violations, imposing fines of more than €8.5 million in total. The head of the authority summed up the results in a review of almost two years in office. They show how the council oversees fair competition in the Latvian market and set the direction for next year.

By the end of the year the council plans to finish three more investigations: a cartel case in funeral services and two retail cases concerning late payments. That would bring the year's total to 11 completed high-priority cases. In 2025 the council completed 7 such cases and in 2024, 3. Lithuania's authority reported 3 cases in 2026, and Estonia's none.

Key decisions

This year the council made two decisions on abuse of a dominant position. The classified-ads platform SIA “SS” restricted users' ability to post ads on competing platforms at the same time. SIA Burde B.V. charged unjustifiably high prices for speed-camera software licences in procurements by CSDD, the Road Traffic Safety Directorate; the prices were dozens of times higher than those set by the software's manufacturer.

In the first half of the year the council also ruled on a prohibited agreement fixing resale prices of JURA coffee machines. It was the first case launched using data from the council's own digital monitoring tool, and the first joint investigation with the Lithuanian and Estonian competition authorities.

In the long-term contracts of the state-owned company AS “Latvijas valsts meži” (LVM), a breach of Article 14.1 of the Competition Law was found, as the state company discriminated against other market participants. It is the council's first decision on a breach of competition neutrality.

Oversight and data analysis

This year 33 merger decisions have been made, more than double the same period of 2025. In food retail, the council carried out procedural actions at the two largest companies after price monitoring of more than 500 products showed identical prices; for over 250 products they stayed unchanged for almost all of 2025. Together with KNAB (Latvia's anti-corruption bureau), the University of Latvia and Riga Technical University, the council is finishing a prototype cartel-screening tool that analyses more than 40 indicators across over 16,000 procurements.

Challenges

In late 2025 the Supreme Court Senate issued a ruling unfavourable to the council in the construction cartel case. On 14 May 2026 the Saeima adopted amendments to the Operational Activities Law allowing information obtained through operational activities to be used. On 24 September the Saeima passed in the final reading amendments to the Criminal Law introducing criminal liability for cartels in large public procurements.