US package delivery giant United Parcel Service is seeking 1.7 billion euros ($2.1 billion) in damages from the European Commission after it stopped the firm's 2013 bid to take over TNT Express. The move by UPS, which was officially lodged in December but made public Monday, was widely expected and follows a decision by an EU court last year that annulled the merger veto by the commission, the bloc's anti-trust regulator.
But that court annulment, which has been appealed by the commission, came too late to save the UPS bid as TNT of the Netherlands was sold off to US-based archrival FedEx in 2016. Merger vetoes are rare by Brussels and TNT Express immediately announced in 2013 that it would shed 4,000 jobs after the failure of the UPS takeover bid.