European Commission v. Deutsche Post AG, case C-399/08 P, First Chamber, Judgment, 2 September 2010

By its appeal, the Commission of the European Communities seeked to have set aside the judgment of the Court of First Instance of the European Communities in Case T 266/02 Deutsche Post v Commission, by which it annulled Commission Decision 2002/753/EC of 19 June 2002 on measures implemented by the Federal Republic of Germany for Deutsche Post AG (OJ 2002 L 247, p. 27). In the current judgment, the EU Court of Justice provides for a very clear definition of state aid under EU Law. Infact, for a national measure to be classified as State aid, first, there must be an intervention by the State or through State resources; second, the intervention must be liable to affect trade between Member States; third, it must confer an advantage on the recipient; fourth, it must distort or threaten to distort competition. The EU Court of Justice concludes by dismissing the appeal introduced by the European Commission, declaring the correctness of the ruling of the EU General Court, which stated that there was no infringement of EU State aid law in the way in which the Federal Republic of Germany restructured the German Postal Administration.