Operating from its base in Luxembourg, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) grants fewer than 100 individuals exceptional authority to shape regulations impacting half a billion people. Members of this esteemed court possess the power to compel governments to revise legislation, mandate corporations to pay billions, and deliver final rulings on laws within the world’s largest trade bloc.
These highly respected legal experts are expected to uphold rigorous standards to prevent any situation that could cast doubt on their decisions. The court’s code of conduct explicitly states that jurists must avoid all circumstances “which may give rise to a conflict of interest… or may be perceived as such.”
However, an investigation by Investigate Europe has brought to light that a significant number of CJEU jurists maintain connections to the very companies the court is empowered to regulate, raising troubling questions.
Exclusive analysis of transparency documents reveals that more than 40 percent of the current judges and advocates-general have declared private financial interests.
These holdings include stakes in major oil companies like Eni and Total, extensive real estate and infrastructure ventures, and well-known brands such as AstraZeneca, Airbus, Amazon, and Boeing.
Investigate Europe discovered instances where jurists participated in cases involving companies or their competitors in which they had registered a financial interest. This practice raises concerns about perceived potential conflicts and the effectiveness of the court’s system designed to guard against such risks. Additionally, many more jurists presided over cases concerning industries where they had also declared financial interests.
A six-month investigation by reporters uncovered notable deficiencies in jurists’ public disclosures, a system where cases at both CJEU courts—the higher Court of Justice and the lower General Court—are assigned without external oversight, and impartiality risks stemming from judges’ ties to their national governments.
In response to these findings, the president of the General Court, Marc van der Woude, informed Investigate Europe that an internal committee would review the revelations.
Concurrently, the European Ombudsman announced its intention to launch an inquiry after Investigate Europe lodged a complaint with the EU administrative body regarding the court’s failure to make judges’ historical declarations public. European Ombudswoman Teresa Anjinho later confirmed to Investigate Europe that she would open an inquiry into the non-publication of past declarations and planned to meet with the court by mid-September to discuss the matter.
Alberto Alemanno, a professor of EU law and EUobserver columnist who has written extensively on judicial openness and public integrity for over a decade, commented, “The Court of Justice of the European Union still falls short of the transparency standards now expected of high supreme courts.”
German advocate general Juliane Kokott, a prominent figure at the Court of Justice and an authority on competition law, holds a diverse share portfolio. According to her most recent public declaration, this includes a German rail infrastructure firm, a physical gold investment fund, and three major pharmaceutical companies: AstraZeneca, BioNTech, and Merck.
The court’s rules do not prohibit such holdings. The code of conduct merely mandates justices to declare financial interests upon taking office and to update these disclosures every three years or whenever changes occur. They are also required to flag any potential conflict when assigned a case and, if necessary, recuse themselves.
While the CJEU’s policies do not provide definitions for conflict of interest, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) defines it as a situation where a public official’s private interests “could improperly influence” their responsibilities. A perceived conflict, according to the OECD, arises when such interests could influence their duties, even if they ultimately do not.
In 2019, Kokott was assigned a case involving French drugmaker Servier versus the European Commission, concerning a hypertension treatment. Two years later, in 2021, she acquired shares in the three pharmaceutical firms, stating her intention was to “contribute – to a very limited extent” to the development of Covid-19 vaccines. In 2022, the advocate general delivered her legal opinion in the Servier case.
Since 2016, Kokott has been called upon to provide opinions in at least eight cases related to the pharmaceutical sector, delivering four of them. The opinions of advocate generals carry significant weight, with judges typically following them in approximately 80 percent of their final rulings.
In her response to Investigate Europe, Kokott asserted that she “strictly followed all relevant rules… in particular those on impartiality and conflicts of interest.”
Regarding the Servier case, Kokott stated that her opinion was ultimately not favorable to the company. She explained, “I pleaded that agreements concluded by the Servier group with generic pharmaceutical companies constituted restrictions of competition. This is in no way beneficial to another brand-name manufacturer, such as AstraZeneca, and thus does not increase its share values.”
Kokott informed reporters that she holds only five shares in AstraZeneca, five in Merck, and seven in BioNTech. When questioned whether owning shares in an industry she also worked on could raise conflict of interest questions, Kokott responded that she did “not share that impression.” She did not address inquiries about whether a perceived conflict had been reviewed by the court.
A senior legal figure familiar with CJEU operations, who requested anonymity, commented, “The fact that a jurist is supportive of the pharmaceutical sector generally is problematic, even if the value of shares is somewhat symbolic. It is about the perception that such cases give, and that is where the issue lies.” There is no indication that Kokott derived material benefits from any of the cases.
However, Kokott is not the only jurist whose private interests appear to align closely with their professional duties.
In 2023, Geert de Baere, a Belgian judge at the CJEU’s General Court, served as one of five judges on a panel that ruled on a case involving BNP Paribas, despite having publicly declared an interest in BNP Paribas Fortis, the French bank’s Belgian subsidiary.
General Court president Marc van der Woude clarified to Investigate Europe that De Baere was not a shareholder in BNP. Instead, he held a current and savings account there, along with an investment “portfolio of shares and stocks of third parties” managed on his behalf.
De Baere was assigned the case, which concerned BNP’s bill to an EU banking agency and which the bank ultimately won, as part of a larger group of cases involving more than 40 banks. Van der Woude explained that De Baere’s inclusion was necessary to “preserve the consistency of the judgments.”
The General Court president admitted he had not examined the interest when De Baere was assigned the case, but stated he would still have approved the judge’s inclusion. The legal figure with knowledge of CJEU proceedings noted that while De Baere holds no shares in BNP itself, his relationship with the bank is “from the perspective of perception… problematic.”
Shari Hinds, senior policy officer at Transparency International EU, emphasized, “Judicial impartiality must remain beyond doubt. Yet some of these cases leave open questions on whether the consequences of perceived conflicts of interest were fully considered when cases were assigned.”
There is no indication that any of these cases constitute an actual conflict of interest. Nevertheless, the findings prompt questions about the checks the court conducts when assigning cases. The court did not respond when asked whether any members had raised the matter for examination upon their assignment to a case.
Professor Alemanno stated, “The system relies almost entirely on self-assessment. A member identifies a possible conflict and notifies the president of the court, who takes the declaration ‘into due account’ when allocating cases. There is no external verification on this, no published reasoning.”
The court maintains that such secrecy is essential to protect judges from external interference. For the same reason, judges deliberate on panels rather than individually.
Throughout the investigation, the court rejected multiple requests from Investigate Europe for information regarding judges’ interests and decision-making processes for case allocation, citing the need for privacy in internal deliberations. It also declined to provide past versions of declarations of interest, despite these being public documents. However, reporters were able to obtain several previous versions through internet-archive websites.
Utilizing openly available documents, Investigate Europe determined that 36 justices collectively declared interests in 124 entities, according to their latest disclosures. Notable companies include fossil fuel giants Eni, Total, and Repsol, weight-loss drug manufacturer Novo Nordisk, aviation leaders Boeing and Airbus, and US tech giant Amazon.
Interests in the finance sector were by far the most prevalent, encompassing European institutions such as Erste Bank, Swedbank, and Bank of Valletta, as well as the US conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway. Five jurists—Malta’s Ramona Frendo, Estonian Lauri Madise, Finland’s Tuula Pynnä, Juliane Kokott, and Austria’s Andreas Kumin—accounted for half of all declared interests.
However, details regarding the size and specific nature of these holdings are almost always omitted from published declarations. Furthermore, nearly a third of declarations were uploaded more than three years ago, seemingly contradicting the court’s own transparency policy.
Interestingly, shortly after Investigate Europe contacted the CJEU for comment in the days leading up to publication, more than 35 jurists’ public disclosures, most of which were outdated, were re-uploaded to the court website with new versions. At the time of publication, at least three declarations still lacked a date, and one had no declaration published at all.
According to the court’s code of conduct, a separate, more detailed version of these declarations is circulated internally but remains inaccessible to the public.
Silje Hermansen, an assistant professor specializing in judicial politics at the University of Copenhagen, believes that allowing judges to hold any form of shareholdings poses an unnecessary risk to the court’s perceived integrity. She noted, “Bear in mind that when a publicly-traded company wins in court, this often has an immediate effect on its stock market value.” Hermansen suggested, “The court should consider a reform where judges sell their shares before taking office. You will never find anyone in the EU institutions who is paid more than these people.”
General Court president van der Woude shared that in his previous role at a private law firm, he and his colleagues were prohibited from owning direct shares, stating, “It was absolutely clear and there was no ambiguity.”
A spokesperson for the CJEU stated that “judges and advocate generals of the Court of Justice are citizens who have private lives and, therefore, decide themselves on how they wish to manage their possessions.” When asked about the wide range of shareholdings, they responded that there was “nothing wrong with owning shares/interests insofar as it does not affect the good administration of justice,” adding that recusal had never been necessary to date.
Additionally, Investigate Europe found that many judges, who are nominated by their home countries for renewable six-year terms, previously held national political office. Some experts believe this could introduce potential impartiality risks in certain cases.
One such example is Luxembourg’s Francois Biltgen, who served as a government minister for 14 years and was a close ally of long-time prime minister (and former EU Commission president) Jean-Claude Juncker. In 2023, Biltgen sat as one of five judges on a high-stakes case concerning Amazon’s tax bill in the Grand Duchy. The European Commission sought to compel Luxembourg to recoup €250 million from the US giant, arguing that Amazon had gained a competitive advantage through tax administration decisions dating back to when Biltgen was in government. The court ultimately ruled in favor of Amazon and Luxembourg.
Biltgen maintained to Investigate Europe that his involvement in no way constituted a conflict of interest, stating, “There can therefore be no appearance of a conflict of interest here, unless the notion of conflict of interest is – unduly – extended.” He noted that the contested decision was made by Luxembourg tax authorities, not the government itself. He added, “Since becoming a CJEU judge, I do not have any official contacts with the Christian Social Party. Moreover, I have never been submitted to political pressure by any political entity, governmental or other.”
According to Silje Hermansen, it is neither uncommon nor against the rules for judges to sit on a panel ruling a case involving their home country, or for former politicians to serve. However, to mitigate any risk of national bias, the court endeavors to ensure judges do not serve as rapporteurs, a crucial role where a judge prepares a draft ruling for their colleagues’ deliberation.
Analysis of a database compiled by IUROPA, a research project tracking CJEU cases, revealed that judges served as rapporteurs approximately 30 times in cases directly involving their home country between 2018 and 2024.
Carles Aulés-Blancher, a Yale University researcher who has studied perceived bias at the court, noted that CJEU justices have “a duty of loyalty to the state that appointed them, and it is these same states that have the power to renew their terms.” For him, the six-year renewable terms act as a “sword of Damocles hanging over the judges’ heads that should be abolished in favour of longer terms.”
In 2010, the European Court of Human Rights revised its own nomination rules for this precise reason, introducing nine-year non-renewable mandates for judges. The senior legal figure, who wished to remain anonymous, stated, “You will not find a single constitutional or supreme court across Europe where judges have renewable mandates. I can tell you, there is anxiety among judges a year before the end of their mandate. And the number of trips they have to do to see ministers, or anybody they have to, because they want to carry on.”
Campaigners have long criticized the method of judge selection, with candidates confirmed behind closed doors by an obscure body known as the 255 Committee, composed of seven European jurists, often former CJEU members. In 2024, Politico reported that a high-ranking FIFA official was part of the 255 Committee, despite the court handling multiple cases concerning the world’s football governing body.
As Koen Lenaerts, president of the CJEU, stated in a 2020 interview, a judge must not have “the slightest personal interest” in a case, emphasizing that “That equal distance is also a matter of perception: none of the parties should entertain any reasonable doubt as to the judge’s impartiality.”
