The encyclopedia · Legal & Compliance · Legal decision · 2025
Six oil majors fined €936.7 million for a biofuel-price cartel
Eni, Esso, Ip, Q8, Saras and Tamoil colluded to inflate the bio component of Italian fuel prices — Italy's largest antitrust fine
Eni · Esso · Ip · Q8 · Saras · Tamoil · 2025-09-26
What happened
On 26 September 2025 Italy's competition authority AGCM fined six fuel suppliers a combined €936,659,087 — the largest antitrust penalty in the country's history — for coordinating the value of the bio component built into motor-fuel prices. The cartel ran from 1 January 2020 to 30 June 2023.
Instead of competing on the bio charge they passed to motorists, the companies exchanged information and moved their prices in parallel. The value of the bio component rose from around €20 per cubic metre in 2019 to around €60 in 2023 — a cost shared almost identically by rivals who were supposed to be undercutting each other.
The fines were split by market share: Eni €336,214,660, Q8 €172,592,363, Ip €163,669,804, Esso €129,363,561, Tamoil €91,029,755 and Saras €43,788,944. Iplom and Repsol, originally investigated, escaped the fine when the evidence showed no agreement involving them.
The case began with a whistleblower's complaint, and the authority found the collusion was helped along by the exact value of the bio component being published in the trade outlet Staffetta Quotidiana — in part fed directly by Eni.
Why it happened
- Six rivals chose to coordinate a cost they all passed to motorists instead of competing on it, turning a regulatory obligation into a shared, inflated charge
- By giving one another a common reference point for the bio component, the companies made their parallel price rises look like normal business rather than a coordinated squeeze on drivers
The lesson
When a legal obligation creates a shared cost, the quiet temptation is to align how you pass it on — but identical price moves across rivals are exactly what an antitrust fine is for
Aftermath
AGCM said the decision reflected the cartel's three-and-a-half-year duration and the harm to consumers. The six companies can appeal in Italy's administrative courts.
Sources
- AGCM — press release on the biofuel cartel decision (I864)
- Il Sole 24 Ore — antitrust sanction of €936 million on six oil companies
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