Monopoly

History is repeating itself. Yet another Greek government has decided to stop every reform - or stop pretending it is implementing any reforms - and start handing out benefits.

Greek state officials have effectively put their pencils down and nothing is happening. 

Privatizations have frozen, and any big symbolic moves have been put on hold. 

Turkish academics have received patent protection in Europe for a compound which could become the country's "national cancer medication".

The businessman Nikolai Banev and his wife Evgenia were detained in France with a European arrest warrant. This is another business family against which a large-scale investigation is being conducted, reports BNT. 

Russia has invited Bulgaria to renegotiate gas prices, Bulgaria's Energy and Water Regulatory Commission chairman Ivan Ivanov told BNT on 5th of September.This became possible after Brussels launched an anti-monopoly case because of the raised prices at which Gazprom sells blue fuel to eight countries in the European Union, including Bulgaria.

Greece's state-owned Public Power Corporation (PPC) will be obliged to sell off more of its power sales to smaller power providers in order to meet binding targets set by the country's 2015 bailout deal to reduce its market dominance.

In a market where power companies are increasingly engaging call centers to advertise complex electricity packages over the telephone, consumers need to be cautious when considering switching energy providers, the Energy Regulatory Authority (RAE) says.

Greece will launch a tender in November to sell a majority stake in gas company DEPA's commercial operations, the country's privatization agency (TAIPED) said on Monday.

The strategic plan of the Hellenic Corporation of Assets and Participations (EESYP) shifts its emphasis to the utilization of the state's real estate assets and to the holdings in state corporations recently conceded to EESYP, the so-called "privatizations hyperfund."

Greece has been missing the targets for privatization revenues ever since it first sought a bailout from the eurozone and the International Monetary Fund in 2010. It will likely continue to do so this year and next unless the process is rethought.

Deutsche Telekom has exercised its right of first refusal and will pay 284.05 million euros ($348.87 million) to acquire a 5 percent stake in Greece's biggest telecom operator OTE, the Greek privatization agency (HRADF) said on Wednesday.