Welcome back. It's great to have your company again. I'm James Panicki, Mlex Asia Senior Editor. This is

Mlex's weekly podcast covering the top stories in regulatory affairs with the assistance of our team of reporters around the globe.

Now, you don't need me to tell you that inflation is still on the rise, and the cranking up of interest rates by central banks hasn't yet been able to rein in the problem.

And the rising cost of living is a headache for politicians

as the anger of voters starts to mount. That in turn leads to questions about whether antitrust

authorities are doing all they can. There's of course the price gouging and the failure to cut

prices quickly when costs go down, but there's also a broader concern

about whether companies are colluding under the cover of inflation rises. It's a tricky

problem for competition regulators to manage. Luckily though, our reporter Tonoghiel has been

following the regulatory response to the inflation rises from our offices in Brussels.

And Tonno joins me now along with Nicholas Hurst, who covers antitrust and MNA.

Tonno, let me start with you.

And let's just recap here for a moment.

How did we get to the place that we're in today?

What caused this situation in the first place?

Hi, James.

Well, here in Europe, we've seen prices go up quite significantly

after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Just so you can get an idea right now,

we have a 7% inflation rate in the EU,

which is pretty much unheard of in the recent history of the block.

First, we had this energy to supply shock that kind of

...