Washington, DC – The Federal Trade Commission and a coalition of 17 states today filed an antitrust enforcement action against Amazon for anticompetitive tactics in the marketplace aimed at stifling competition by promoting its own services at the expense of third party sellers who depend on the company’s marketplace, and by impeding the growth of smaller platforms.
Sumit Sharma, senior researcher for tech competition at Consumer Reports, said, “American consumers increasingly discover and buy goods and services online, and this activity is concentrated on a few large online platforms like Amazon. Amazon directly competes with sellers on its platforms, so it’s incentivized to set terms and conditions that increase its profits to the detriment of consumers and sellers.
“The unchecked power of Amazon has often resulted in higher prices and fewer choices for consumers. We applaud the FTC and 17 state attorneys general for opening this investigation into Amazon’s monopoly power,” Sharma said.
Contact: Cyrus Rassool, cyrus.rassool@consumer.org