Finance
German antitrust watchdog drops probe into DHL's corporate mail consolidation
Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on July 7, 2025
1 min readLast updated: January 23, 2026
Global Banking & Finance Review®
Company
Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on July 7, 2025
1 min readLast updated: January 23, 2026
Germany's antitrust regulator ends DHL probe after the company resolves competition concerns by selling its Compador stake.
DUESSELDORF, Germany (Reuters) -Germany's antitrust regulator has dropped an investigation into alleged anti-competitive conduct at the nation's largest postal services group DHL after the company cut ownership ties with a competitor in the handling of letters for companies.
The Federal Cartel Office's two-year probe focused on so-called mail consolidation, where DHL's Deutsche Post InHaus Services collects and processes letters from several companies, granting discounts on the aggregate volumes.
DHL competes with postal services group Max-Ventures in this market, but the two also held 26% and 74%, respectively, in another player in that market segment called Compador.
The antitrust authority said that DHL had allayed its concerns by selling its Compador stake to Max-Ventures and also by cancelling contracts to process orders for Max-Ventures that the two could now renegotiate without any ownership ties.
DHL said it welcomed the closure of the proceedings.
"We were always of the opinion that Deutsche Post AG and Deutsche Post InHaus Services had not violated competition law, and we see this confirmed," it added.
(Reporting by Matthias Inverardi, writing by Ludwig Burger, editing by Thomas Seythal and Miranda Murray)
The investigation focused on DHL's mail consolidation practices, where Deutsche Post InHaus Services collects and processes letters from multiple companies.
DHL alleviated the concerns by selling its stake in Compador to Max-Ventures and canceling contracts to process orders for Max-Ventures.
DHL welcomed the closure of the proceedings, stating they believed they had not violated competition law, which was confirmed by the investigation's conclusion.
DHL competes with Max-Ventures in the mail consolidation market, where they also held stakes in another player called Compador.
The investigation lasted for two years before being dropped by the Federal Cartel Office.
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