InBev, the world’s largest beer producer, and three other European breweries are facing hefty fines today for operating an illegal cartel in the Netherlands during the mid to late 1990s.

In 2000, the European Commission raided the quartet - InBev, Heineken, Grolsch and Bavaria - after suspecting that they had broken European Union competition policy rules by colluding to carve up the Dutch market between themselves.

Five years later, it formally charged the companies with price-fixing, allocating customers, discussing individual customers and exchanging confidential information between 1994 and 1999. According to the Commission, the practice kept the price of beer artificially high in supermarkets, hotels, restaurants and cafés.

The Commission would not comment yesterday about the possibility of penalties, but Véronique Schyns, a spokes-woman for Heineken, the world’s fourth-largest brewer by volume, said that fines were imminent.

“We have been expecting a decision for some time and, according to reports in the Netherlands, we expect a fine,” she told The Times.

InBev and Grolsch, the third-largest brewer in the Netherlands, refused to comment until a decision was made.

The Commission is expected to determine the fines today. Under EU rules, these can be as high as 10 per cent of a company’s worldwide turnover and would take account of the duration and gravity of the offence.

However, under an amnesty scheme penalties can be reduced or even waived for companies that voluntarily provide the Brussels regulators with evidence enabling them to uncover illegal business practices. The crackdown is the latest example of the determination of Neelie Kroes, the European Competition Commissioner, to use her antitrust powers to punish companies that flaunt European rules and prevent consumers benefiting from lower prices.

Last year, the Commission imposed fines worth €1.85 billion (£1.25 billion) on companies involved in cartels. Already this year the penalties have reached €1.7 billion.

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