The Brazilian Antitrust Tribunal And The MFN Clauses

There are supply agreements in which the buyer, trying to protect itself, inserts a clause providing that in case supplier sells the same product to a third party to prices lower than the ones agreed in the supply agreement, supplier shall offer to buyer the lower price practiced with third parties. Those clauses are known in the market as "most favoured nation clauses" ("MFN clauses"), after a similar system of the treaties on international trade.

The goal of such MFN clauses is to permit the persons benefited by them to obtain the best prices available in the market for the purchase of raw materials or parts and components, and, by doing so, eliminating any competitive disadvantage they may have vis-à-vis their competitors, which otherwise could buy the same products at lower prices.