Official Journal of the European Union

C series

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C/2025/3246

24.6.2025

(Case C-630/23,

(1)

AxFina Hungary (Continued existence of the contract))

(Reference for a preliminary ruling - Consumer protection - Directive 93/13/EEC - Unfair terms in consumer contracts - Leasing agreement denominated in a foreign currency - Articles 6 and 7 - Unfair term placing the exchange rate risk on the consumer - Effects of a finding that the term is unfair - Invalidity of the contract - Effects of the annulment of the contract in its entirety)

(C/2025/3246)

Language of the case: Hungarian

Referring court

Parties to the main proceedings

Appellants: ZH, KN

Respondent: AxFina Hungary Zrt.

Operative part of the judgment

Article 6(1) of Council Directive 93/13/EEC of 5 April 1993 on unfair terms in consumer contracts, read in conjunction with Article 7(1) thereof,

must be interpreted as not permitting the inference that a leasing agreement that is denominated in a foreign currency, and that has been rendered invalid following the removal from it of a term considered unfair that places the exchange rate risk associated with that foreign currency on the consumer concerned, is capable of ‘continuing in existence without the unfair terms’, within the meaning of the first of those provisions, where that agreement is covered by national legislation that requires, as a legal consequence of the invalidity of such an agreement, that the consumer be freed entirely from the detrimental effects of the unfair term only, while the other elements of that agreement remain valid and binding. In such a situation, since the agreement is not capable of continuing in existence without that term, those provisions require the restoration of the legal and factual situation which the consumer would have been in if that agreement had not existed.

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(1) OJ C C/2024/629.

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ELI: http://data.europa.eu/eli/C/2025/3246/oj

ISSN 1977-091X (electronic edition)

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