Strong Force. The latest ruling from the Superior Court of Justice of the Canary Islands regarding the towage service in the Port of Las Palmas reported by the newspaper Atlántico Hoy is not merely a procedural victory for Boluda, nor a setback for Fairplay Towage. It is, above all, a broader indication of the current tilt in the balance between competition and control in Spanish ports: judges are increasingly willing to accept quasi-monopolistic structures when presented as the price for security and service continuity.
The process dates back to 2020, but today Boluda is 49% owned by MSC, which owns Opcsa through TIL, which in turn is 30% owned by Blackrock and the Singapore sovereign fund. Boluda has as a partner in the Canary Islands the Moroccan port terminal operator Marsa Maroc and is in co-signature with the Greek group Laskadiris, with which it will develop a 50% offshore wind assembly plan in Las Palmas.
The ruling annuls the license granted to the German subsidiary Odiel Towage, but does so without questioning the underlying model. On the contrary: it validates the regulatory framework that requires a minimum fleet of nine tugboats, flagged in Spain and deployed across various islands, a threshold that in practice can only be met by the historical operator. The implicit message is clear: competition is welcome as long as it does not disrupt the existing balance.
The Security Argument
The court does not comment on efficiency or pricing. It relies on a much more legally solid ground: maritime safety and occupational risk prevention. By requiring prior compliance, regional reports, and complete self-protection plans, the court raises the bar to a point where the entry of new operators ceases to be an economic issue and becomes a scale problem. This is a logic familiar in regulated sectors: the more critical the service is defined, the easier it is to justify requirements that, without saying so, freeze the market.
The Role of the Port
The Port Authority of Las Palmas comes out formally defeated —the ruling imposes costs— but politically strengthened. The terms it strengthened after the conflict have not only withstood judicial scrutiny but are now indirectly backed by a ruling that adopts its narrative: better an oversized operator than several more agile but less “secure” ones. In advanced locations like Rotterdam or Hamburg, such reasoning often raises eyebrows. In ports, however, it is seen as pragmatism.
Tolerated Monopolies, Deferred Competition
The case of Las Palmas illustrates a broader trend in European logistics: regulatory tolerance towards functional monopolies when the cost of a service disruption is perceived as unacceptable. Towage, pilotage, or stevedoring are areas where free competition is invoked in the abstract but diluted in practice. For Fairplay, the message is unequivocal: without a disproportionate initial investment, entry is impossible. For Boluda, the ruling is equivalent to a judicial extension of its hegemony. For the port system, it is a confirmation that judges, at least for now, prefer stability over friction.
The Long-Term Risk
The problem with this approach is not immediate but structural. Regulated monopolies tend to confuse themselves with the general interest and resist any attempt at future reform. When law becomes a shield to preserve the status quo, competition ceases to be a principle and becomes a theoretical hypothesis. The ruling from the TSJC does not create the monopoly of towage in Las Palmas, but it legitimizes it. And in ports, as in markets, judicial legitimization tends to last longer than any license.
The Courts and the Comfortable Geometry of Monopoly
In theory, European ports are open markets where competition disciplines prices, incentivizes efficiency, and reduces systemic risks. In practice, they are ecosystems where stability often prevails over friction, and where courts, increasingly naturally, act as arbiters in favor of the incumbent. The ruling annuls the license granted to an incoming operator, but does so without questioning the framework that makes the entry of new actors almost impossible. The result is not a market correction but its freezing.
Security as a Common Language
The judicial reasoning is impeccable from a formal standpoint: risk prevention, self-protection plans, mandatory reports, prior and not deferred compliance. Concepts that are difficult to dispute and politically untouchable. However, the aggregate effect is less neutral than it seems. When security becomes the central argument, competition ceases to be evaluated in terms of efficiency or service and begins to be measured in terms of financial muscle and operational scale. The bar is raised to a point where only those already inside can meet it without tension.
