Abstract:
The article defines the historical prerequisites for the appearance of Art. 222-2 and 232-2 in the Special Part of the Criminal Code of Ukraine in the context of establishing criminal liability for abuse on wholesale energy markets and three main periods are distinguished. The first period (from 1990 to 2001) was marked by the initiation of the process of active reform of criminal legislation, which aimed to bring its provisions into
line with new economic realities and led to the decriminalization of a number of articles of Chapter VI of the Criminal Code of Ukraine of 1960.
The author established that the second period (2001-2014) began with the adoption of the current Criminal Code of Ukraine and is characterized by the "balance" of the criminal law protection of economic activity: the criminal legislation "got rid" of anachronisms that existed during the Soviet era, and with on the other hand, a number of prohibitions appeared in it, according to which liability was assumed for new forms
of crime "characteristic" of a multi-system market economy. At this time, a certain strategy for the development of legislation on economic criminal offenses is being formed, the purpose of which is to reduce the level of criminalization of offenses in the field of economic activity. The author proved that the third period began in 2014, when the Association Agreement between Ukraine and the European Union was
concluded, which resulted in the adoption of the Laws of Ukraine "On the Natural Gas Market" dated April 9, 2015, "On the Electric Energy Market" from April 13, 2017, as well as the adoption of the Law of Ukraine "On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine Regarding Simplification of Investment Attraction and Introduction of New Financial Instruments" dated June 19, 2020. Because of the entry into force of the above-mentioned normative legal act, Chapter VII appeared in the system of the Criminal Code of Ukraine of two new special prohibitions on the establishment of criminal liability for abuse in wholesale energy markets (Articles 222-2 and 232-3).
