PRESS RELEASE
8 September 2021

PCC launches guide on competition law for bar examinees 

The Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) launched today a dedicated mini-site holding an online library of reference materials for law graduates and bar examinees.

Available at https://www.phcc.gov.ph/competition-law-bar-reference-materials/ (shortened url: https://bit.ly/pca-bar-notes), the webpage offers highlight notes on the Philippine Competition Act (PCA-Republic Act No. 10667) and its Implementing Rules and Regulations, and was organized based on the outline contained in Supreme Court Bar Bulletin No. 7, series 2020.

The guide is meant to aid bar reviewees, especially since the competition law debuts into the bar examinations this year as part of the commercial law syllabus. The PCA joins other covered topics in the examinations such as laws on securities, business organization, banking, insurance, intellectual property, and other special laws governing secured transactions, lending, anti-money laundering, foreign investments, insolvency and data privacy.

The PCC website is also replete with additional references, Commission rulings, and legal literature useful for antitrust lawyers and aspiring competition practitioners. As a fairly new law, the launch of the bar notes mini-site forms part of PCC’s advocacy to improve the public understanding of competition law and policy, especially in the legal community.

The PCC, as competition authority of the country, promotes market competition and investigates anti-competitive mergers that result in the rise of monopolies or elimination of emerging rivals in the market, anti-competitive agreements such as cartels and bid-riggings, and abuses of dominance among businesses.

The 2020 and 2021 online bar examinations, chaired by Associate Justice Marvic M.V.F. Leonen, is set to take place in 24 testing centers across the country on Nov. 7, 14, 21, and 28, 2021.

[Update: As cited in Bar Bulletin No. 28 s. 2021, the Supreme Court en banc has decided to move the 2020/2021 Bar Examinations from November 2021 to January 16 to February 6, 2022. The PCA Bar Notes microsite remains in place for the examinees and will update its content as necessary.]

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