DOJ and! FTC Look at Certain Pricing Practices

摘要

The Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) held a joint workshop at the end of June with economists and lawyers to explore two types of conditional pricing practices — single-product discounts (e.g., loyalty or market share discounts) and multiproduct discounts (e.g., bundled pricing). Loyalty or market share discounts are where a seller offers a discount to buyers who purchase all or nearly all of their needs from the seller. Plaintiffs in antitrust cases typically allege that the loyalty discounts are so aggressive that the seller's competitors cannot compete, and that the lack of competition leads to higher prices.