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Commission: Green light on the contract extension of “El. Venizelos”

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The European Commission, on the basis of EU rules about the state aid, approved the extension for 20 years of the concession contract that has been assigned to Athens International Airport SA (AIA) for the exploitation of Athens Airport.

According to the Commission’s announcement, the price that will be paid by AIA for the extension meets the markets rules and, therefore, AIA does not receive unjustified financial advantage or aid.

“The Commission considered that the 1.1 billion that will be paid by AIA for the 20-year extension of the Athens Airport concession contract, corresponds to the market price”, said the Competition Commissioner, Margrethe Vestager. She also added:

“As a result, AIA will not benefit from state aid in the form of unjustifiably low price for the concession contract. The Commission cooperated actively with the Greek authorities in order to achieve that positive outcome, which is one of the most important financial transactions relevant to the Greek privatisation programme”.

Commission’s announcement

The Commission announcement states that, according to the EU rules, a concession contract about infrastructure commercial exploitation cannot be regarded as state aid, as long as it is assigned under terms which would be accepted by a private company acting under market terms, if that company offered a concession contract for similar assets.

The Commission found that the initial value for the extension of the concession contract proposed by AIA, amounting to €484 million, was based on economic and business parameters that were not comply with market conditions.

Considering that no private operator would have accepted such an offer, the extension of the concession contract under these terms would constitute state aid.

As Commission notes, Greece cooperated actively with the Commission to determine the appropriate market value for the extension of the concession contract, which would no longer constitute state aid. After relevant discussions, the price that should be paid by AIA to Greece has increased considerably and amounts to €1.115 million.

Keeping in mind the increased price, the Commission decided that the concession contract extension cannot be considered state aid, as AIA will pay a price that respects the market conditions for the continuation of Athens International Airport exploitation.

The current Commission decision, finding that there is no aid to the concession contract extension, is one of the prerequisites that must be met in order for the extension contact to come into force.

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