Article 99, 100 and 101: the penalty structure per obligation

Article 101(1) provides that the Commission may impose on providers of general-purpose AI models fines not exceeding 3 % of their annual total worldwide turnover in the preceding financial year or EUR 15 000 000, whichever is higher, where it finds that the provider intentionally or negligently infringed the relevant provisions of this Regulation, failed to comply with a request for a document or for information pursuant to Article 91 or supplied incorrect, incomplete or misleading information, failed to comply with a measure requested under Article 93, or failed to make available access to the model with a view to conducting an evaluation pursuant to Article 92. In fixing the amount of the fine or periodic penalty payment, regard shall be had to the nature, gravity and duration of the infringement, taking due account of the principles of proportionality and appropriateness, and the Commission shall also take into account commitments made in accordance with Article 93(3) or made in relevant codes of practice in accordance with Article 56. Paragraph 2 requires the Commission to communicate its preliminary findings to the provider and give it an opportunity to be heard before adopting the decision. Paragraph 3 provides that fines imposed shall be effective, proportionate and dissuasive. Paragraph 4 provides that information on fines imposed shall also be communicated to the Board as appropriate. Paragraph 5 gives the Court of Justice of the European Union unlimited jurisdiction to review decisions of the Commission fixing a fine and provides that it may cancel, reduce or increase the fine. Paragraph 6 requires the Commission to adopt implementing acts containing detailed arrangements and procedural safeguards for proceedings that may lead to a decision under paragraph 1. Article 101 is excluded from the earlier application of Chapter XII and has therefore applied since 2 August 2026. Alongside this regime, Article 100 carries its own scheme for Union institutions, bodies, offices and agencies: the European Data Protection Supervisor may impose administrative fines on them of up to EUR 1 500 000 for non-compliance with the prohibition in Article 5 and up to EUR 750 000 for non-compliance with other requirements or obligations under this Regulation. Regulation (EU) 2026/1744 did not amend Articles 100 and 101.

Article 75c(4), inserted by Regulation (EU) 2026/1744, provides that a decision of the AI Office may be accompanied by the imposition of penalties in accordance with Article 99(3) to (7), which provisions apply mutatis mutandis to the Office in the execution of its supervision and enforcement tasks referred to in Article 75(1). In particular, the following are subject to administrative fines as referred to in Article 99(4): infringement of any applicable provision of this Regulation, including those not listed in Article 99(4); failure to comply with decisions or measures adopted pursuant to Article 14(4) or Article 16(3) of Regulation (EU) 2019/1020 and the powers specified in Article 75a; and failure to comply with a commitment made binding pursuant to Article 75b. The supply of incorrect, incomplete or misleading information to the Office is subject to the fines of Article 99(5). Paragraph 5 additionally allows the Office to impose periodic penalty payments to compel, among other things, submission to an investigation, compliance with an information request, submission to an inspection or compliance with a binding commitment; those payments shall not exceed 5 % of the average daily income or worldwide annual turnover in the preceding financial year per day. Paragraph 6 gives the Court of Justice unlimited jurisdiction over decisions of the Office fixing a fine or periodic penalty payment, and paragraph 8 subjects the powers of the Office to a limitation period of five years, with the same period for the power to enforce decisions taken. Note: the two authentic language editions of Regulation (EU) 2026/1744 diverge here. The English edition states five years in both subparagraphs of Article 75c(8); the Dutch edition states three years in both subparagraphs of Article 75 quater(8). This statement renders in each language what the edition in that language says and makes no silent choice. The implementing act under Article 75d(3) is to specify both subparagraphs, including the circumstances in which the limitation periods are interrupted; until it exists, the divergence remains an open question of interpretation.

The ceiling follows the provision, not the harm. That is the point routinely missed in boardrooms: a single amount gets budgeted for "the AI Act fine", while operators face three bands in Article 99 and there are separate regimes on top for Union institutions and for providers of general-purpose AI models. The highest band, EUR 35 million or 7 percent, belongs to Article 5 alone. Until recently that was a list of practices you either engage in or do not, but since the amendment of Article 5 that is no longer true: for the new prohibitions on sexual imagery, placing on the market is also prohibited where such generation is a reasonably foreseeable and reproducible outcome and the system lacks reasonable and adequate technical safety measures and safeguards. That is a duty to take measures inside the highest band, and it applies from 2 December 2026. The middle band, EUR 15 million or 3 percent, belongs to the enumeration in paragraph 4: the role duties of the provider, the authorised representative, the importer, the distributor and the deployer, since 27 July 2026 also Article 25(2) and (4), plus Article 50. What is not named there is at least as interesting: Article 4 and Article 27 do not appear, and the requirements of Chapter III reach the ceiling at most through Article 16 and Article 26. Note that Article 72 and Article 73 do come within reach for the deployer, because Article 26(5) obliges it to inform in accordance with Article 72 and declares Article 73 applicable mutatis mutandis, and Article 26 is named in paragraph 4. Two further things. Paragraph 5 turns answering an information request badly into its own fine category at 1 percent, independently of the underlying infringement. And paragraph 7 is not a discount scheme: it works both ways, because its opening words concern the decision whether or not to impose a fine and point (e) expressly names aggravating factors such as financial benefits gained. What you can steer are the factors you can evidence: your technical and organisational measures, your notification behaviour, your cooperation, and what you did after an incident to mitigate the harm suffered by affected persons. Two dates that matter in practice: the prohibition in Article 5 has applied since 2 February 2025 but Chapter XII only since 2 August 2025, so for conduct in between there is no administrative fine under Article 99(3). That gap does not return for the new Article 5 prohibitions of 2 December 2026: Chapter XII will by then have applied for well over a year, so the penalty regime exists on the day those prohibitions start to apply. And whoever falls within the competence of the AI Office must drop the idea that the enumeration in paragraph 4 is closed: Article 75c(4) places infringement of any applicable provision in the EUR 15 million or 3 percent band there, expressly including provisions not listed in paragraph 4.