On April 28, 2026, CADE’s General Superintendence opened Administrative Proceeding No. 08700.007894/2023-88 to investigate potential anticompetitive conduct by Gol and LATAM in the Brazilian domestic passenger air transportation market. Before converting the inquiry into an administrative proceeding, the General Superintendence focused the analysis on three routes of high commercial relevance – São Paulo-Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo-Curitiba and Brasília-São Paulo –, which represented more than 80% of the database examined, evaluating the average daily fares practiced between 2022 and 2023. CADE’s General Superintendence’s Technical Opinion pointed to evidence of reciprocal price monitoring, suggesting that each company would use the competitor’s prices as a reference to define its own tariffs.
The investigation was initiated in 2023, based on representation from the Public Prosecutor’s Office, and involved examining the use of dynamic pricing tools, market databases, and advanced analysis techniques conducted by the Brain Project (Projeto Cérebro) team. The General Superintendence sought to verify whether the persistent pattern of interdependence identified would result from legitimate competitive dynamics or would reflect tacit collusion facilitated by algorithms and data sharing.
Contracts signed by the companies with suppliers of intelligence services and technological solutions were also analysed. The General Superintendence highlighted that, in concentrated markets with high informational transparency, the convergent use of these tools can reduce competitive uncertainty and expand the coordination capacity between economic agents.
Although the dynamics observed were not, at first, associated with a deliberate coordinated effort, according to the General Superintendence, the lack of sufficient clarification on the functioning of pricing systems and the use of “sophisticated” algorithms, capable of adjusting prices almost instantaneously, intensified the competition concerns. The General Superintendence emphasized that, even in the absence of coordinated intent, companies could still be held liable for potential negligence in supervising these systems, particularly in a market where practically three companies (Azul, Gol, and LATAM) account for almost the entirety of supply.
