Price fixing

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Price fixing is an anticompetitive agreement between participants on the same side in a market to buy or sell a product, service, or commodity only at a fixed price, or maintain the market conditions such that the price is maintained at a given level by controlling supply and demand.

Contents

The intent of price fixing may be to push the price of a product as high as possible, generally leading to profits for all sellers but may also have the goal to fix, peg, discount, or stabilize prices. The defining characteristic of price fixing is any agreement regarding price, whether expressed or implied.

Price fixing requires a conspiracy between sellers or buyers. The purpose is to coordinate pricing for mutual benefit of the traders. For example, manufacturers and retailers may conspire to sell at a common "retail" price; set a common minimum sales price, where sellers agree not to discount the sales price below the agreed-to minimum price; buy the product from a supplier at a specified maximum price; adhere to a price book or list price; engage in cooperative price advertising; standardize financial credit terms offered to purchasers; use uniform trade-in allowances; limit discounts; discontinue a free service or fix the price of one component of an overall service; adhere uniformly to previously announced prices and terms of sale; establish uniform costs and markups; impose mandatory surcharges; purposefully reduce output or sales in order to charge higher prices; or purposefully share or pool markets, territories, or customers.

Price fixing is permitted in some markets but not others; where allowed, it is often known as resale price maintenance or retail price maintenance.

Not all similar prices or price changes at the same time are price fixing. These situations are often normal market phenomena. For example, the price of agricultural products such as wheat basically do not differ too much, because such agricultural products have no characteristics and are essentially the same, and their price will only change slightly at the same time. If a natural disaster occurs, the price of all affected wheat will rise at the same time. And the increase in consumer demand may also cause the prices of products with limited supply to rise at the same time. [1]

In neo-classical economics, price fixing is inefficient. The anti-competitive agreement by producers to fix prices above the market price transfers some of the consumer surplus to those producers and also results in a deadweight loss.

International price fixing by private entities can be prosecuted under the antitrust laws of many countries. Examples of prosecuted international cartels are those that controlled the prices and output of lysine, citric acid, graphite electrodes, and bulk vitamins. [2]

United States

In the United States, price fixing can be prosecuted as a criminal federal offense under Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act. [3]

Criminal prosecutions must be handled by the U.S. Department of Justice, but the Federal Trade Commission also has jurisdiction for civil antitrust violations. Many state attorneys general also bring antitrust cases and have antitrust offices, such as Virginia, New York, and California. Further, where price fixing is used as an artifice to defraud a U.S. government agency into paying more than market value, the U.S. attorney may proceed under the False Claims Act.

Private individuals or organizations may file lawsuits for triple damages for antitrust violations and, depending on the law, recover attorneys fees and costs expended on prosecution of a case. [4] [5] If the case at hand also violates the False Claims Act of 1863, in addition to the Sherman Act, private individuals may also bring a civil action in the name of the United States under the Qui Tam provision of The False Claims Act.

Under American law, exchanging prices among competitors can also violate the antitrust laws. That includes exchanging prices with the intent to fix prices or the exchange affecting the prices individual competitors set. Proof that competitors have shared prices can be used as part of the evidence of an illegal price fixing agreement. [5] Experts generally advise that competitors avoid even the appearance of agreeing on price. [5]

Since 1997, US courts have divided price fixing into two categories: vertical and horizontal maximum price fixing. [6] Vertical price fixing includes a manufacturer's attempt to control the price of its product at retail. [7] In State Oil Co. v. Khan , [8] the U.S. Supreme Court held that vertical price fixing is no longer considered a per se violation of the Sherman Act, but horizontal price fixing is still considered a breach of the Sherman Act. Also in 2008, the defendants of United States v LG Display Co., United States v. Chunghwa Picture Tubes, and United States v. Sharp Corporation, heard in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, agreed to pay a total sum of $585 million to settle their prosecutions for conspiring to fix prices of liquid crystal display panels. That was the second largest amount awarded under the Sherman Act in history. [6]

Canada

In Canada, it is an indictable criminal offence under Section 45 of the Competition Act. Bid rigging is considered a form of price fixing and is illegal in Canada (s.47 Competition Act).

Australia

Price fixing is illegal in Australia under the Competition and Consumer Act 2010, with considerably similar prohibitions to the US and Canadian prohibitions. The Act is administered and enforced by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission. Section 48 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) explicitly states, "A corporation shall not engage in the practise of resale price maintenance." A broader understanding of the statutory provision is in Section 96(3)of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth), which broadly defines what can be resale price maintenance.

New Zealand

New Zealand law prohibits price fixing, among most other anti-competitive behaviours under the Commerce Act 1986. The act covers practices similar to that of US and Canadian law, and it is enforced by the Commerce Commission. [9] [10]

European Union

Under the EU commission's leniency programme, whistleblowing firms that co-operate with the antitrust authority see their prospective penalties either wiped out or reduced. [11]

United Kingdom

British competition law prohibits almost any attempt to fix prices. [12]

The Net Book Agreement was a public agreement between UK booksellers from 1900 to 1991 to sell new books only at the recommended retail price to protect the revenues of smaller bookshops. The agreement collapsed in 1991, when the large book chain Dillons began discounting books, followed by rival Waterstones. [13] [14]

However, price-fixing is still legal in the magazine and newspaper distribution industry, and sometimes in the motion picture industry. [15] Retailers who sell at below cover price are subject to withdrawal of supply. The Office of Fair Trading has given its approval to the status quo.[ citation needed ]

Exemptions

When the agreement to control price is sanctioned by a multilateral treaty or is entered by sovereign nations as opposed to individual firms, the cartel may be protected from lawsuits and criminal antitrust prosecution. That is why OPEC, the global petroleum cartel, has not been prosecuted or successfully sued under US antitrust law.

International airline tickets have their prices fixed by agreement with the IATA, a practice for which there is a specific exemption in antitrust law. [16] [ better source needed ]

Examples

Compact discs

Between 1995 and 2000, music companies were found to have used illegal marketing agreements such as minimum advertised pricing to artificially inflate prices of compact discs in order to end price wars by discounters such as Best Buy and Target in the early 1990s. It is estimated customers were overcharged by nearly $500 million and up to $5 per album. A settlement in 2002 included the music publishers and distributors; Sony Music, Warner Music, Bertelsmann Music Group, EMI Music, Universal Music as well as retailers Musicland, Trans World Entertainment and Tower Records. In restitution for price fixing they agreed to pay a $67.4 million fine distribute $75.7 million in CDs to public and non-profit groups.

Dynamic random access memory (DRAM)

In October 2005, the Korean company Samsung pleaded guilty to conspiring with other companies, including Infineon and Hynix Semiconductor, to fix the price of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips. Samsung was the third company to be charged in connection with the international cartel and was fined $300 million, the second largest antitrust penalty in US history.

In October 2004, four executives from Infineon, a German chip maker, received reduced sentences of 4 to 6 months in federal prison and $250,000 in fines after agreeing to aid the U.S. Department of Justice with their ongoing investigation of the conspiracy.

Capacitors

In March 2018, the European Commission fined eight firms, mostly Japanese companies, €254 million for operating an illegal price cartel for capacitors. [17] The two largest players were Nippon Chemi-Con which was fined €98 million and Hitachi Chemical which was fined €18 million. [17]

Perfume

In 2006, the government of France fined 13 perfume brands and three vendors for price collusion between 1997 and 2000. The brands include L'Oréal (€4.1 million), Chanel (€3.0 million), LVMH's Sephora (€9.4 million), and Hutchison Whampoa's Marionnaud (€12.8 million). [18]

Liquid crystal displays

In 2008 in the US, LG Display Co., Chunghwa Picture Tubes and Sharp Corp., agreed to plead guilty and pay $585 million in criminal fines [19] [20] for conspiring to fix prices of liquid crystal display panels.

South Korea–based LG Display would pay $400 million, the second-highest criminal fine that the US Justice Department antitrust division has ever imposed. Chunghwa would pay $65 million for conspiring with LG Display and other unnamed companies and Sharp would pay $120 million, according to the department. [21] [22]

In 2010, the EU fined LG Display €215 million for its part in the LCD price fixing scheme. [23] Other companies were fined for a combined total of €648.9 million, including Chimei Innolux, AU Optronics, Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd., and HannStar Display Corp. [24] LG Display said it is considering appealing the fine. [25]

Air cargo market

In late 2005/early 2006, Lufthansa and Virgin Atlantic came forward about their involvement in large price-fixing schemes for cargo and passenger surcharges in which 21 airlines were involved since 2000 (amongst which were British Airways, Korean Air, and Air France-KLM). U.S. Department of Justice fined the airlines a total of $1.7 billion, charged 19 executives with wrongdoing and four received prison terms. [26]

In December 2008, the New Zealand Commerce Commission filed legal proceedings against 13 airlines in the New Zealand High Court. According to the Commission, the carriers "colluded to raise the price of [freight] by imposing fuel charges for more than seven years". [27] In 2013 Air New Zealand was the final airline of the 13 to settle. [28]

The Commission noted that it might involve up to 60 airlines. [29] In 2009 the Commission said overseas competition authorities were also investigating the air cargo market, including the US and Australia where fines had been imposed. [27]

Tuna

An attempt to fix the price of tuna resulted in a $25 million fine for Bumble Bee Foods in 2017 and a $100 million fine for StarKist in 2020. Christopher Lischewski, the former CEO of Bumble Bee, was sentenced to 40 months in jail and fined $100,000 for his 2010–2013 involvement. [30]

Coronavirus vaccine

During the COVID-19 pandemic, companies such as Pfizer and Moderna announced rates for their coronavirus vaccines that would differ based on deals established with various governments. Executive orders were enacted in the United States to lower prescription drug costs which was claimed by Pfizer's CEO to cause "enormous destruction" to the pharmaceutical industry. [31]

1990s airlines

Airlines in the 1990's were blocked by the US Department of Justice from continuing to use software to share data on routes and prices before they became public. [32]

Rent algorithm

ProPublica in 2022 investigated the use of algorithms created by RealPage by rental companies across the United States to set rents, which critics worry has helped to raise rents by limiting competition. [32] The US DOJ escalated its investigation into price-fixing in March of 2024, [33] and filed an anti-trust lawsuit in August of 2024. [34]

Signs of possible price fixing during bidding

It is more common to have price fixing trends during the bidding process, such as:

Impact of price fixing

When prices are determined between various companies, it may affect consumers' choices to a certain extent, and affect small businesses that rely on these suppliers. [36]

Taking freight as an example, many products are now transported by freight through various channels. If the freight price is artificially increased, it will have an impact on the entire supply chain. For example, it will cause the price of goods and services to increase, and it will also affect consumers' choices. [35]

Criticism on legislation

Economic liberals believe that price fixing is a voluntary and consensual activity between parties that should be free from government compulsion and government interference. At times price fixing ensures a stable market for both consumers and producers. Any short-term benefit of increased price competition will force some producers out of the market and cause product shortages and prices for consumers to rise. In the end price-fixing legislation forces producers out of a market because it can not compete with the biggest discounter and the market winds up a monopoly anyway. [37]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cartel</span> Mutually beneficial collusion among competing corporations

A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collude with each other as well as agreeing not to compete with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market. A cartel is an organization formed by producers to limit competition and increase prices by creating artificial shortages through low production quotas, stockpiling, and marketing quotas. Cartels can be vertical or horizontal but are inherently unstable due to the temptation to defect and falling prices for all members. Additionally, advancements in technology or the emergence of substitutes may undermine cartel pricing power, leading to the breakdown of the cooperation needed to sustain the cartel. Cartels are usually associations in the same sphere of business, and thus an alliance of rivals. Most jurisdictions consider it anti-competitive behavior and have outlawed such practices. Cartel behavior includes price fixing, bid rigging, and reductions in output. The doctrine in economics that analyzes cartels is cartel theory. Cartels are distinguished from other forms of collusion or anti-competitive organization such as corporate mergers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Air Transport Association</span> International trade association for airlines

The International Air Transport Association is a trade association of the world's airlines founded in 1945. IATA has been described as a cartel since, in addition to setting technical standards for airlines, IATA also organized tariff conferences that served as a forum for price fixing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">United States antitrust law</span> American legal system intended to promote competition among businesses

In the United States, antitrust law is a collection of mostly federal laws that govern the conduct and organization of businesses in order to promote economic competition and prevent unjustified monopolies. The three main U.S. antitrust statutes are the Sherman Act of 1890, the Clayton Act of 1914, and the Federal Trade Commission Act of 1914. These acts serve three major functions. First, Section 1 of the Sherman Act prohibits price fixing and the operation of cartels, and prohibits other collusive practices that unreasonably restrain trade. Second, Section 7 of the Clayton Act restricts the mergers and acquisitions of organizations that may substantially lessen competition or tend to create a monopoly. Third, Section 2 of the Sherman Act prohibits monopolization.

Collusion is a deceitful agreement or secret cooperation between two or more parties to limit open competition by deceiving, misleading or defrauding others of their legal right. Collusion is not always considered illegal. It can be used to attain objectives forbidden by law; for example, by defrauding or gaining an unfair market advantage. It is an agreement among firms or individuals to divide a market, set prices, limit production or limit opportunities. It can involve "unions, wage fixing, kickbacks, or misrepresenting the independence of the relationship between the colluding parties". In legal terms, all acts effected by collusion are considered void.

Anti-competitive practices are business or government practices that prevent or reduce competition in a market. Antitrust laws ensure businesses do not engage in competitive practices that harm other, usually smaller, businesses or consumers. These laws are formed to promote healthy competition within a free market by limiting the abuse of monopoly power. Competition allows companies to compete in order for products and services to improve; promote innovation; and provide more choices for consumers. In order to obtain greater profits, some large enterprises take advantage of market power to hinder survival of new entrants. Anti-competitive behavior can undermine the efficiency and fairness of the market, leaving consumers with little choice to obtain a reasonable quality of service.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">European Union competition law</span> Economic law of the European Union

In the European Union, competition law promotes the maintenance of competition within the European Single Market by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies to ensure that they do not create cartels and monopolies that would damage the interests of society.

Predatory pricing is a commercial pricing strategy which involves the use of large scale undercutting to eliminate competition. This is where an industry dominant firm with sizable market power will deliberately reduce the prices of a product or service to loss-making levels to attract all consumers and create a monopoly. For a period of time, the prices are set unrealistically low to ensure competitors are unable to effectively compete with the dominant firm without making substantial loss. The aim is to force existing or potential competitors within the industry to abandon the market so that the dominant firm may establish a stronger market position and create further barriers to entry. Once competition has been driven from the market, consumers are forced into a monopolistic market where the dominant firm can safely increase prices to recoup its losses.

Competition law is the field of law that promotes or seeks to maintain market competition by regulating anti-competitive conduct by companies. Competition law is implemented through public and private enforcement. It is also known as antitrust law, anti-monopoly law, and trade practices law; the act of pushing for antitrust measures or attacking monopolistic companies is commonly known as trust busting.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">DRAM price fixing scandal</span> 2002-2018 Court cases in US & Europe

In 2002, the United States Department of Justice, under the Sherman Antitrust Act, began a probe into the activities of dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) manufacturers in response to claims by US computer makers, including Dell and Gateway, that inflated DRAM pricing was causing lost profits and hindering their effectiveness in the marketplace.

LG Display Co., Ltd. is one of the world's largest manufacturers and supplier of thin-film transistor liquid crystal display (TFT-LCD) panels, OLEDs and flexible displays. LG Display is headquartered in Seoul, South Korea, and currently operates nine fabrication facilities and seven back-end assembly facilities in South Korea, China, Poland and Mexico.

The lysine price-fixing conspiracy was an organized effort during the mid-1990s to raise the price of the animal feed additive lysine. It involved five companies that had commercialized high-tech fermentation technologies, including Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Ajinomoto, Kyowa Hakko Kogyo, Sewon America Inc. and Cheil Jedang Ltd. A criminal investigation resulted in fines and three-year prison sentences for three executives of ADM who colluded with the other companies to fix prices. The other four companies settled with the United States Department of Justice Antitrust Division in September through December 1996. Each firm and four executives from the Asian firms pleaded guilty as part of a plea bargain to aid in further investigation against ADM. The cartel had been able to raise lysine prices 70% within their first nine months of cooperation.

Article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union prohibits cartels and other agreements that could disrupt free competition in the European Economic Area's internal market.

The Commerce Commission is a New Zealand government agency with responsibility for enforcing legislation that relates to competition in the country's markets, fair trading and consumer credit contracts, and regulatory responsibility for areas such as electricity and gas, telecommunications, dairy products and airports. It is an independent Crown entity established under the Commerce Act 1986. Although responsible to the Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs and the Minister of Broadcasting, Communications and Digital Media, the Commission is run independently from the government, and is intended to be an impartial promotor and enforcer of the law.

The history of competition law refers to attempts by governments to regulate competitive markets for goods and services, leading up to the modern competition or antitrust laws around the world today. The earliest records traces back to the efforts of Roman legislators to control price fluctuations and unfair trade practices. Throughout the Middle Ages in Europe, kings and queens repeatedly cracked down on monopolies, including those created through state legislation. The English common law doctrine of restraint of trade became the precursor to modern competition law. This grew out of the codifications of United States antitrust statutes, which in turn had considerable influence on the development of European Community competition laws after the Second World War. Increasingly, the focus has moved to international competition enforcement in a globalised economy.

Competition law theory covers the strands of thought relating to competition law or antitrust policy.

United Kingdom competition law is affected by both British and European elements. The Competition Act 1998 and the Enterprise Act 2002 are the most important statutes for cases with a purely national dimension. However, prior to Brexit, if the effect of a business' conduct would reach across borders, the European Commission has competence to deal with the problems, and exclusively EU law would apply. Even so, the pre-Brexit section 60 of the Competition Act 1998 provides that UK rules are to be applied in line with European jurisprudence. Like all competition law, that in the UK has three main tasks.

The De Beers diamonds antitrust class action sought to end an alleged 60-year conspiracy to fix the price of rough diamonds in the U.S. by the De Beers group of companies. The litigation includes several cases including Hopkins v. De Beers Centenary A.G., et al., No. CGC-04-432954, which commenced on July 24, 2004, and Sullivan v. DB Investments, No. 04-cv-02819, and earlier related cases that commenced in 2001.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Competition Commission of India</span> Competition regulator in India

The Competition Commission of India (CCI) is the chief national competition regulator in India. It is a statutory body within the Ministry of Corporate Affairs and is responsible for enforcing the Competition Act, 2002 to promote competition and prevent activities that have an appreciable adverse effect on competition in India. The CCI looks into cases and investigates them if the same has a negative impact on competition.

<i>TFT-LCD (Flat Panel) Antitrust Litigation</i> United States class-action lawsuit

The TFT-LCD Antitrust Litigation was a United States class-action lawsuit regarding the worldwide conspiracy to coordinate the prices of Thin-Film Transistor-Liquid Crystal Display (TFT-LCD) panels, which are used to make laptop computers, computer monitors and televisions, between 1999 and 2006. In March 2010, Judge Susan Illston certified two nationwide classes of persons and entities that directly and indirectly purchased TFT-LCDs – for panel purchasers and purchasers of TFT-LCD integrated products; the litigation was followed by multiple suits.

References

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  2. ↑ Connor, John M. (April 2004). Extraterritoriality of the Sherman Act and Deterrence of Private International Cartels (Report). American Agricultural Economics Association . Retrieved September 30, 2014.
  3. ↑ "15 U.S. Code § 1 - Trusts, etc., in restraint of trade illegal; penalty". law.cornell.edu. Legal Information Institute . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  4. ↑ "About Antitrust Bureau". oag.state.ny.us. New York State Attorney General. Archived from the original on September 29, 2008. Retrieved June 15, 2016.
  5. 1 2 3 "Be Careful About Antitrust Law!". Art Publishers Association. February 2000. Archived from the original on September 27, 2007. Retrieved June 15, 2016.
  6. 1 2 Tsui, Tat Chee (April 2011). "Interstate Comparison – Use of Contribution Margin in Determination of Price Fixing". Pace International Law Review Online Companion. 1. SSRN   1839223.
  7. ↑ Sauer, Raymond D. "VERTICAL PRICE FIXING". Archived from the original on July 8, 2013. Retrieved July 9, 2013.
  8. ↑ State Oil Co. v. Khan , 522 U.S. 3 (1997).
  9. ↑ "Commission warns GP's about price fixing". Release No 133 (Press release). Commerce Commission. May 18, 2005. Archived from the original on April 16, 2009.
  10. ↑ "Commerce Act 1986". Parliamentary Counsel Office. October 5, 2022 [Originally published April 28, 1986]. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  11. ↑ Gow, David (April 18, 2007). "Heineken and Grolsch fined for price-fixing". The Guardian . Brussels. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  12. ↑ "Avoid and report anti-competitive activity". gov.uk. Government of the United Kingdom . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  13. ↑ Daunton, Martin, ed. (2005). The Organisation of Knowledge in Victorian Britain. Oxford University Press/British Academy. p. 275. doi:10.5871/bacad/9780197263266.001.0001. ISBN   978-0197263266.
  14. ↑ Cassidy, Suzanne (October 7, 1991). "THE MEDIA BUSINESS; British Book Shops in Price Skirmishes" . The New York Times . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  15. ↑ Stevens, John Paul (April 2020). "Price-Fixing in the Motion Picture Industry" (PDF). Northwestern University Law Review . 114 (7): 1787–1804. ISSN   0029-3571 . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  16. ↑ "Australia: IATA enters price fixing saga". Competition Policy International. October 7, 2012. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  17. 1 2 JiJi (March 22, 2018). "EU fines Japanese firms over price-fixing cartel for capacitors". The Japan Times . Brussels. Archived from the original on March 22, 2018. Retrieved 22 March 2018.
  18. ↑ Passariello, Christina (March 15, 2006). "France Fines Perfume Makers And Vendors in Price-Fixing Case". The Wall Street Journal . Paris. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  19. ↑ Frieden, Terry (November 12, 2008). "$585 million LCD price-fixing fine". CNN . Washington, D.C. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  20. ↑ "LG, Sharp, Chunghwa Agree to Plead Guilty, Pay Total of $585 Million in Fines for Participating in LCD Price-fixing Conspiracies". justice.gov. Washington, D.C.: United States Department of Justice . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  21. ↑ Bliss, Jeff (November 12, 2008). "LCD Makers Will Plead Guilty in Price-Fixing Scheme (Update2)". Bloomberg News . Archived from the original on October 23, 2012.
  22. ↑ "UPDATE 2-LG Display, Sharp, Chunghwa say guilty in LCD case". Reuters . November 12, 2023. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  23. ↑ White, Aoife (December 8, 2010). "LCD-Panel Makers Fined $649 Million by European Union for Price Fixing" . Bloomberg News . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  24. ↑ "Joaquín Almunia Vice President of the European Commission responsible for Competition Policy Press conference on LCD cartel, Visa and French chemists' association decisions Press conference Brussels, 8 December 2010". europa.eu (Press release). European Commission. December 8, 2010. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  25. ↑ Kim, Yoo-chul (December 9, 2010). "2 LCD giants face contrasting fates". The Korea Times . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  26. ↑ Caldwell, Alicia A. (March 5, 2011). "21 airlines fined in price-fixing scheme". NBC News . Retrieved January 20, 2023.[ dead link ]
  27. 1 2 "Commerce Commission procedure in accordance with standard best practice". Release no 113 (Press release). Commerce Commission. March 20, 2009. Archived from the original on September 6, 2009. Retrieved June 23, 2014.
  28. ↑ "Air New Zealand final airline to settle with Commerce Commission in air cargo case" (Press release). Commerce Commission. June 13, 2013. Archived from the original on October 3, 2014. Retrieved June 23, 2014.
  29. ↑ "International air cargo cartel to be prosecuted" (Press release). Commerce Commission. December 15, 2008. Retrieved June 23, 2014.
  30. ↑ Garcia, Sandra E. (June 16, 2020). "Former Bumble Bee C.E.O. Is Sentenced in Tuna Price-Fixing Scheme" . The New York Times . ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  31. ↑ Lovelace Jr., Berkeley (July 28, 2020). "Pfizer CEO says Trump's executive orders overhauling U.S. drug pricing will upend the industry". CNBC . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  32. 1 2 Vogell, Heather; Coryne, Haru; Little, Ryan (2022-10-15). "Rent Going Up? One Company's Algorithm Could Be Why". ProPublica. Retrieved 2024-08-21.
  33. ↑ Sisco, Josh (March 20, 2024). "DOJ escalates price-fixing probe on housing market". Politico.
  34. ↑ Vogell, Heather (2024-08-23). "DOJ Files Antitrust Suit Against Maker of Rent-Setting Algorithm". ProPublica. Retrieved 2024-08-24.
  35. 1 2 "Cartels". accc.gov.au. Australian Competition & Consumer Commission . Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  36. ↑ Erickson, W. Bruce (March 1976). "Price Fixing Conspiracies: Their Long-Term Impact". The Journal of Industrial Economics. 24 (3): 189–202. doi:10.2307/2098269. JSTOR   2098269.
  37. ↑ DeBow, Michael E. (1988). "What's Wrong with Price Fixing: Responding to the New Critics of Antitrust". Regulation . Vol. 12, no. 2 (Summer 1988). American Enterprise Institute . Retrieved January 20, 2023– via Cato Institute.
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