De Minimis Ceiling Unchanged

Just before the Christmas break, the European Commission has adopted a revision of the Regulation on small aid amounts, the so-called de minimis regulation. Prior to adoption of the revised Regulation, three public consultations were opened that gave the Commission sufficient feedback both from Member States and business organisations all over the EU.

The main debate concerned the idea of whether to raise the ceiling for de minimis support, which was set to 200 000 EUR per undertaking over 3 fiscal years, or to keep it at the same level. The European business community was not unanimous in this matter. While some business organisations supported the idea of keeping the same ceiling, others wanted to include inflation in the final figure and raise the ceiling accordingly, and some even proposed to allow businesses to obtain more than double the 200 000 EUR sum. In the end, the Commission did not find sufficient evidence in the public consultation responses to prove that a higher ceiling would be justified and therefore the limit has not been changed in the new regulation. Nevertheless, the specification changed slightly as the new legislation clearly defines that the limit applies per Member State.

The idea of setting up a mandatory central register monitoring the amount of de minimis aid given to an undertaking in each Member State would increase transparency was relatively well taken by the business community; however, the final regulation does not include this provision and it remains up to each Member State to decide whether the declaration of the aid will be made by beneficiary or a central register. Although de minimis revision is over, other revisions under state aid modernisation initiative remain closely watched by the business community, especially the General block exemption Regulation which should be finalised before the European Parliament elections