The U.S. Department of Justice brought criminal charges against online retailers for conspiring to fix prices by utilizing algorithm-based pricing software, among other means. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit ruled that a real estate owner and developer had standing to assert antitrust claims against a supermarket chain even though the developer was neither a competitor nor a customer of the defendant, because its injury from alleged interference with obtaining permits was inextricably intertwined with the harm to a rival supermarket. A district court set aside a jury verdict finding that a cable provider unlawfully tied its premium service to the rental of set-top boxes because those boxes were not available from any other source.

Other recent antitrust developments of note include the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit's partial reversal of a jury verdict that a steel distribution boycott violated antitrust law and enforcement actions by U.S. antitrust agencies for failure to comply with premerger notification regulations.

Pricing Algorithm

A U.K.-based online retailer and an owner-director of the company were charged with fixing prices of posters sold over the Internet to U.S. customers, based on an alleged agreement to adopt specific computer pricing algorithms for the sale of certain posters, among other allegations. See DOJ Press Release, Dec. 4, 2015. The Department of Justice filed an indictment in the Northern District of California charging Trod Ltd (doing business as Buy 4 Less, Buy For Less and Buy-For-Less-Online) and the owner-director with fixing the prices of posters sold online through Amazon Marketplace from September 2013 through January 2014. According to the indictment, defendants and their co-conspirators used commercially available algorithm-based pricing software to price their products sold on Amazon. This software operates by collecting competitor pricing information for a specific product sold on Amazon and applies a pricing rule set by the seller.