Germany's top court rules on class action truck cartel lawsuit

Germany's top court on Tuesday ruled that claims for damages arising from antitrust violations may in principle be bundled in class-action lawsuits filed by debt collection agencies, in a case involving inflated prices for lorries.

However, the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) also said that if the bundling makes it impossible for the courts to provide effective legal protection, a split into multiple proceedings may be required.

The case involves a multimillion-euro damages lawsuit brought by buyers of lorries after the European Union fined major manufacturers for illegal pricing agreements.

The European Commission imposed fines of nearly €4 billion ($4.7 billion) on the truck manufacturers DAF, Daimler, Iveco, Scania, and Volvo/Renault for exchanging sales prices from 1997 to 2011. MAN was exempted from penalties as a key witness. 

The commission left open whether buyers had suffered damages as a result of the cartel, and the truck manufacturers dispute that they did.

The buyers of approximately 70,000 trucks allegedly sold at inflated prices are demanding around €500 million ($588 million) in damages from MAN, Daimler, Iveco, and Volvo/Renault.

They have assigned their claims to the debt collection and legal services provider Financialright Claims, which is acting as the sole plaintiff and will receive a 33% commission if the case is successful.

The lawsuit had failed in the first instance in 2020 at the Munich Regional Court. 

However, in March 2024, the Higher Regional Court came to a different conclusion on appeal. The defendant truck manufacturers challenged the decision, bringing the case to Germany’s top civil court. 

The BGH has now overturned the appeal trial's ruling and referred the case back to Munich for a retrial and a new decision. Among other things, the Higher Regional Court must examine whether the assignments made by the lorry buyers are potentially void due to a conflict of interest with the litigation financier. 

The BGH also said Financialright Claims had combined a very large number of legally and factually complex claims in a disorganized manner, making it unrealistic for a single court panel to deal with the entire case within a reasonable timeframe.

Following the ruling, Daimler Truck said it would continue to strongly contest the claims and maintained that customers had not suffered any financial losses.