The European Union court has ruled that the economic subsidies granted by Italy during the Covid-19 pandemic to the former national airline Alitalia, now in extraordinary administration, constitute aid compatible with the internal market. No administrative offenses that could be configured as irregular state aid. With these reasons the judges rejected the appeal presented by the low-cost airline Ryanair.

In 2020, the Italian Government created a fund of 350 million euros to remedy the damage suffered by airlines due to travel restrictions resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic. The support was limited to companies operating public service flights (according to European legislation). Alitalia had benefited from 73.02 million Euros (from 1 March to 15 June 2020) and another 199.45 million (from 16 June to 31 October 2020).

The European Commission had considered that these measures constituted state aid, but that they were compatible with the internal market. Therefore, the Ryanair company had asked the European Union court to annul the Commission's decisions on the assumption that, according to the low-cost company, there was a lack of a formal examination of the Italian air market which should have been activated by the Commission. However, the requests were rejected by the judges in Brussels.