Hong Kong’s Competition Ordinance became effective today, December 14, 2015.  The Hong Kong Competition Commission issued a press release: “Competition Ordinance Comes into Full Effect Today.”

I discussed some aspects of Hong Kong’s proposed Competition  Ordinance in an earlier post: “Hong Kong’s Competion Regime Ready for Full Launch.”  The South China Morning Post today published an article by Denise Tsang (denise.tsang@scmp.com) about the Competition Ordinance.  The full article is here.   Some highlights:

• “A law in the making for more than two decades, the Competition Ordinance is set to check anti-competition behaviour as the city joins more than 100 other jurisdictions with such laws.”
• “In Hong Kong, the competition law remains a civil liability. Offenders face a fine of up to 10 per cent of their Hong Kong turnover for each year of the infringement. Company directors face a ban of up to five years and can be sued by clients.”
• “As its first order of business, [Anna Wu Hung-yuk, Chairperson of the Commission],
  said the commission had identified property maintenance firms and fuel suppliers such as petrol stations as top targets of research, as the former were notorious for bid rigging and the latter for cartels.”

The home page of the Hong Kong Competition Commission can be found here.

Thanks for reading.