Digital platforms and blockchain – is the same abuse of dominance bottle good for so different wines?

The features of so-called “digital platforms” have grabbed the headlines of competition law specialised publications for the last years: (i) easy internalisation of positive externalities generated by a user group on one side of the platform though their selling to a group on the other side; (ii) reduced transaction costs – which further increase the ability to channel positive externalities between platform sides; (iii) the exacerbated intensity of increasing returns to scale because of minimal marginal costs; or (iv) the greater value of data thanks to developments in storing and analysis technology.

These characteristics make certain economic laws applicable to digital platforms, the corollary of which seems to be a natural tendency toward monopolistic positions that maximise positive externalities arising in the form of network effects – often spilling over into neighbouring markets and producing economies of scope. This is the setting where platform operators having a quasi‑regulatory control over important, or even essential, bottlenecks to arrays of related markets (gatekeepers) emerge – which does not have to pose any concerns from the competition point of view where bottlenecks are free from permanent and significant barriers to entry.

However, the economic principles behind blockchain (so-called crypto-economics) are quite different due to its specific characteristics: (i) decentralisation (ii) transparency as regards executed transactions and opacity as regards content and parties; (iii) automaticity; (iv) immutability; and (v) multi-layer structure. Therefore, well-targeted abuse of enforcement needs the wheat to be separated from the chaff in the digital world beforehand. With many thanks to Alastria for allowing me to participate in the second issue of Alastria Legal, the purpose of my contribution (pages 41-43 – pages 38-40 in Spanish) is to shed some light on this distinction.

Abuse of dominance in digital platforms and blockchain: Is the same bottle good for so different wines?

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