Ryanair Holdings Plc lost its European Union court challenge over a €150 million ($163 million) Covid-19 bailout for rival carrier Austrian Airlines AG.
The EU’s top court in Luxembourg said Monday that a 2020 loan by Austrian authorities didn’t violate the bloc’s tough state-aid rulebook, backing an earlier ruling from its lower tribunal.
Ryanair — Europe’s biggest discount airline — has filed more than two dozen challenges over the billions of state aid doled out by EU nations to carriers — winning some cases in the bloc’s lower court over subsidies for the likes of Lufthansa and Air France-KLM.
The EU recently defeated a top court challenge against regulators’ approval of a €10 billion Spanish bailout fund.
Ryanair has argued that the subsidies shouldn’t have been waved through by the EU because they distorted competition in the industry.