ISLAMABAD: The Competition Appellate Tribunal (CAT) has upheld the Competition Commission of Pakistan`s (CCP) decision against Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM), affirming its ruling that the state-owned enterprise had abused its dominant position in the sale of low-carbon steel billets.

The CCP had imposed a penalty of Rs25 million for PSM`s anti-competitive and discriminatory conduct. While acknowledging the violation, the tribunal partially allowed PSM`s appeal and reduced the penalty to Rs5m, citing the limited duration of non-compliance.

The CCP took suo motu notice in 2009 following media reports and a complaint by Frontier Foundry (Pvt) Ltd, which alleged preferential treatment by PSM towards a particular buyer, Abbas Group, at the expense of other market participants.

CCP`s investigation revealed that PSM withheld the supply of key steel products between November 2008 and January 2009 without any objective justification, thereby violating Section 3 of the Competition Ordinance 2007. The tribunal observed that PSM failed to inform all buyers of product availability, enabling exclusive access for a single group and causing harm to other market players. Such conduct constituted abuse of dominance under Section 3(2)(g)and(h)ofthe ordinance, it declared.