Competition Commissioner Adv. Michal Cohen has informed supermarket chain Shufersal (TASE: SAE) of her intention of imposing a financial sanction of NIS 8 million, subject to a hearing, after the company gave a partial response to demands for data.
The Competition Authority’s demand was sent to Shufersal, as well as to other supermarket chains, as part of a comprehensive study of the food retailing sector in Israel, with the aim of examining its costs and prices structure.
The Competition Authority reports that Shufersal sent an incomplete response on its operating costs, and that the missing data were eventually sent after months and repeated approaches.
“Receiving full, precise data without delays is critically important to the work of the Competition Authority, whether in enforcement procedures by the Authority, or in examinations of the implications of mergers and deals for which approval is requested, or in market investigations that the Authority carries out,” the Competition Authority stated, adding that “the Competition Commissioner has the legal power to require data under section 46b of the Economic Competition Law… the Competition Authority will continue to act determinedly to ensure that all required data are provided in full, reliably and accurately, and will take enforcement measures against entities in breach of the law.”
Shufersal will be able to present its case to the Competition Commissioner before a final decision is made on the fine.
Shufersal said in a statement: “Shufersal acts in full compliance with the law. The company receives many demands for data from the Competition Authority, and regularly provides data to it in huge quantities, and cooperates fully. That is how it was in the case in question, and the company therefore believes that there is no basis for the notification of the liability. The company will make its arguments on the substance of the case in the hearing procedure.”
At the end of 2024, the Consumer Protection and Fair Trade Authority announced its intention of imposing a NIS 2.1 million fine on Shufersal, Israel’s biggest supermarket chain, for failure to display prices, display of prices without VAT, differences in price between the shelf and the checkout, breach of the disclosure obligation for products subject to price controls, and misleading display of prices. The breaches were not at Shufersal’s regular stores, but at its wholesale format braches braded as Cash & Carry.
A month earlier, the Consumer Protection and Fair Trade Authority imposed a NIS 800,000 fine on the Rami Levi Chain Stores Hashikma Marketing 2006 (TASE: RMLI) for similar breaches at a branch on a similar format.
Published by Globes, Israel business news – en.globes.co.il – on May 22, 2025.
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