Injured parties, indirect purchasers and causation in compensatory damages for infringements of competition law

1. EU and Spanish legislation. Directive 2014/104/EU («the Directive») and the Spanish Competition Act («the Act»), as amended by the transposition of Royal Decree-Act 9/2017, partially govern actions for damages for infringements of arts. 101 and 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union («the TFEU») and arts. 1 and 2 of the Act. Among other varied matters pertaining to the law of damages that are not dealt with by the Directive and the Act, our main concern is the topic concerning the causal relationship between behaviour and harm, causation. Essentially, we address here the harm caused to third parties by the existence of cartel prices…