Are EU state aid challenges by competitors always a ‘nuclear option’?

How should fiscal state aid issues be addressed where the national tax provisions creating the aid are not based on a simple exemption from a standard rate but arise from differential rate regimes and asymmetric taxes? A case currently before the Swedish courts illustrates that this type of case raises fundamentally different issues and may require a different solution when it comes to recovery. Such cases are not so much exceptional as reflect a different category of cases raising different considerations. The principled answer may therefore in some cases be to reverse the aid by repaying the competitor.