5 indictments will be filled against Victory and Yohannoff chains for price coordination attempt

The Competition Authority has decided to file 5 indictments, subject to a hearing, against Eyal Ravid, CEO and the controlling owners of the Victory chain, Efi Tshuva, CEO of Super Barkat, and Elad Harzi, VP of Sales at Yohannoff on suspicion of price coordination. Eitan Yohannoff has administrative responsibility for the attempted coordination of His VP of Trade.
The Competition Authority has conversations from which it appears that in October 2021, Eyal Ravid worked to prevent discounts, through coordination with the VP of Sales of the Yohannoff chain, that even if the chain's sales in shekels decrease following the price increases that led to a quantitative reduction in consumption, as long as their market share According to Stornext, they will not deepen the promotions. In another case, Ravid was interviewed in preparation for the imposition of the purchase tax on disposable utensils and revealed what he thinks the new prices of the HDP will be after the tax increase. The next day, Super Barkat Ephraim Tshuva's CEO called Ravid to ask at what price to sell the disposable tools after the tax increase, and the two agreed that they would not reduce the gross profit they had on the disposable tools before the tax was imposed. At the beginning of May, Ravid was summoned to a hearing before indictment More public statements about raising prices.
In addition, 3 more innovative indictments will be filed against Ravid, for violations of the law in food with three different suppliers: Shastovitz, Dr. Fisher and Beit Al-Hasita. This is the first time that criminal enforcement has taken place for the violation of Section 6 of the Food Law, which deals with the prohibition of a retailer interfering with the prices for the consumer of another retailer. In this context, after receiving price increases from the suppliers, Ravid raised prices for the consumer and, seeing that the prices at his competitors did not rise accordingly, he turned to Shastowitz, Beit Al-Hashiteh and Dr. Fisher, and asked them to ensure that the price for the consumer would also rise at Rami Levy and Yohannoff.
This is a kind of binding arrangement, not made between two direct competitors, but through the supplier as a third party. This is similar to the conduct of Effie Rosenhuis, who, when he served as CEO of Shufersell and saw discounts at Mega, contacted the suppliers in anger that Shamga was offering low prices and demanded that they take care of it. These are five indictments that are added to the indictments filed in recent months against Strauss and Willy Food, on suspicion of tying arrangements.
Attorney Nati Shimhoni, Assaf Shubinski and Assaf Klein, representing the Victory chain and Eyal Ravid, responded: "We received the letter of suspicion and the summons of the company and Ravid for a hearing at the Competition Authority. Our clients are convinced that there was no flaw in their actions and we are imbued with faith that after our position has been explained in the hearing, the authority will come to an informed decision according to which - there is no place to prosecute our clients and order the case to be closed."