Competition Act 2010 and the MyCC

When five poultry-feed millers quietly agreed to raise their prices in step, it eventually showed up at the wet market in the price of a chicken. In December 2023, Malaysia’s competition regulator fined them a combined RM415.5 million — the largest competition penalty in the country’s history — for breaking a law many businesses still barely know exists.

That law is the Competition Act 2010, and the regulator is the Malaysia Competition Commission (MyCC). Together they set the rules for how firms are allowed — and not allowed — to compete.

What does the Competition Act 2010 actually ban?

The Act came into force on 1 January 2012, and it is built around two prohibitions.

Section 4 — anti-competitive agreements. No enterprise may enter into an agreement (with a competitor or with a business at another level of the supply chain) that “significantly prevents, restricts or distorts competition.” Some conduct is so harmful that it is treated as automatically illegal — no excuses accepted — when it happens between competitors:

• Price-fixing — agreeing what to charge
• Market-sharing — carving up customers or territories
• Bid-rigging — coordinating who “wins” a tender
• Output-limiting — agreeing to restrict production or supply

Section 10 — abuse of a dominant position. A firm is allowed to be big and successful. What it may not do is abuse market power. Prohibited abuses include imposing unfair prices or trading terms, refusing to supply, tying unrelated products together, and predatory pricing designed to push rivals out. Market dominance is generally indicated by a share above 60%, though MyCC looks at the wider commercial reality rather than a single number.

Notice what is not here: being a monopoly is not itself illegal, and — as of 2026 — there is no general requirement to seek clearance before a merger or acquisition.

Who enforces it, and what can they do?

MyCC is a statutory body established on 1 April 2011. It can investigate on its own initiative or after a complaint, demand documents and information, conduct market reviews, and issue binding decisions.

When MyCC finds an infringement of Section 4 or Section 10, its headline power is a financial penalty of up to 10% of the enterprise’s worldwide turnover over the whole period during which the infringement occurred. Two features make this bite harder than many people expect:

• It is measured against worldwide turnover, not just Malaysian revenue.
• It runs over the entire infringement period, not a single year — and there is no fixed ringgit ceiling.

A decision by MyCC can be appealed to the Competition Appeal Tribunal, an independent body that reviews the merits of the case.

What are the safe harbours and exclusions?

Not every agreement is caught. MyCC’s guidance recognises “safe harbour” thresholds below which an agreement is unlikely to be considered significant:

Type of agreement	Safe-harbour market share
Horizontal (between competitors)	Combined share of 20% or less
Vertical (between supply-chain levels)	Each party’s share of 25% or less

These thresholds do not protect the automatically-illegal conduct above — a price-fixing cartel is illegal regardless of market share.

Whole sectors also sit outside MyCC’s reach because they have their own regulators and competition rules. These include communications and multimedia, energy and petroleum, and aviation. Certain activities carried out under direct government authority, or of a non-commercial nature, are likewise excluded.

How harshly is it enforced in practice?

For its first decade the Act was often described as under-used. That has changed. Between 2012 and July 2026, MyCC imposed RM667.3 million in penalties on 270 companies, according to Deputy Minister Fuziah Salleh in the Dewan Negara, and it has continued to open cartel and bid-rigging investigations across construction, services and food supply.

The poultry-feed case is the landmark. The infringement — coordinated price increases running from January 2020 to June 2022 — was found to breach Section 4. Four of the five millers appealed; on 11 February 2026 the Competition Appeal Tribunal dismissed every appeal, unanimously upholding the RM415.5 million penalty.

The practical lesson for businesses: the risk is no longer theoretical, and price signalling in a WhatsApp group or an industry meeting can become evidence of a cartel.

What is changing under the 2026 amendments?

Parliament has moved to sharpen the regime. The Competition (Amendment) Bill 2026 (and a companion bill on the Commission itself) was passed by the Dewan Negara on 27 July 2026. Key changes include:

• Broader reach for Section 4 — the prohibition now applies to “any agreement,” not only strictly horizontal or vertical arrangements, capturing more complex commercial conduct.
• Interim measures — MyCC can issue directions during an ongoing investigation to prevent serious harm before a final decision.
• A settlement mechanism — an enterprise that admits liability can obtain a penalty reduction of up to 40%, on top of any leniency discount.
• Stronger information powers, including the ability to compel information from government entities, and an explicit eye on digital-economy tactics.

One thing the 2026 bills did not introduce is a general merger-control regime. Merger provisions were floated in an earlier public consultation but were not carried into the 2026 amendments; the omission does not rule out their introduction later through fresh legislation or subsidiary regulation. For now, most M&A deals still proceed without MyCC pre-clearance.

What should a business do about it?

Compliance is mostly about habits, not lawyers on retainer. A workable baseline:

1. Never discuss prices, bids, customers or output with competitors — not in meetings, chats, or “just among friends.”
2. Train staff who touch pricing and tenders so they can recognise and refuse a cartel invitation.
3. Review distribution and supply contracts for resale-price maintenance, exclusivity and tying clauses.
4. If you are large in your market, stress-test your conduct against the Section 10 abuse categories before acting.
5. If you discover a cartel you are part of, get advice on leniency fast — the first to come forward can win the biggest reduction.

What’s next

Watch three things over the coming period. First, the commencement and detailed rules that flesh out the 2026 amendments — the broadened Section 4 and the new settlement route change how firms will manage risk. Second, MyCC’s pipeline of cartel and bid-rigging cases, which will show whether the poultry-feed fine was a one-off or the new normal. Third, whether and how a merger-control regime is eventually introduced — through future legislation or subsidiary regulation — which would, for the first time, put large deals under advance review.

For related reading on the wider legal landscape, see the entries on the Consumer Protection Act, the Companies Act 2016, and how a bill becomes law in Malaysia. This article is a general overview and not legal advice; for a specific situation, consult a qualified competition-law practitioner.