The performance from year to year

Objective

In this project, our primary objective was to find legal arguments and convincing evidence to allow the courts to review this dispute based on the merits of this particular case, rather than based on common practice, where courts typically side with the FAS and automatically recognize banks as violators of fair competition laws. We were able to have the courts to access the evidence pertaining to this particular case, their scope and reliability, recommendations made by FAS and how they were followed by the bank.

Had the courts upheld the FAS decision, the bank would have face negative consequences throughout Russia, since the bank’s operations disputed by FAS in one region, were used throughout the entire country.

Resolution

Our legal support of the bank comprised of three steps:

1. We formulated an appropriate legal arguments to be used in court;
2. Provided necessary evidence to support our arguments; and
3. Convinced the courts in the illegitimate nature of the FAS actions. 

Result

The bank avoided a penalty of over 120 million Rubles. In addition, based on this case, we were able to prove that, despite the commonly negative judicial practice, decisions of the Federal Antimonopoly Service in similar cases can be successfully challenged with convincing evidence and legal arguments. This case was groundbreaking, since all prior decisions of the FAS in similar cases were ruled by courts to be legitimate.