Recently, the National Development and Reform Commission announced that 18 raw material enterprises have been fined 457 million yuan in accordance with the law for violating the Anti Monopoly Law. Two weeks ago, only five companies were announced by the media, and the fine amount was only 100 million yuan.

The process of this anti-monopoly case is as follows: at the beginning of this year, the National Development and Reform Commission received a report that some operators of polyvinyl chloride resin (hereinafter referred to as "PVC" in English) implemented price monopoly, jointly pushing up the sales price of PVC, increasing the cost burden of downstream enterprises that use it as raw material, and damaging the legitimate rights and interests of consumers.

After receiving the report, the National Development and Reform Commission immediately launched an anti-monopoly investigation.

The investigation found that 18 companies involved in the case reached multiple monopoly agreements on unified price increases through WeChat groups during the sales of PVC products in 2016, resulting in a significant increase in PVC market prices. According to the investigation, from March to December 2016, the involved companies held 6 meetings under the name of "Northwest Chlor Alkali Consortium" to exchange market trends, discuss production and sales volume, and reached 13 price monopoly agreements through WeChat groups, jointly pushing up the price of PVC