FTC abandons disparate-impact cases in policy shift

The Federal Trade Commission will no longer pursue claims based on disparate impact or a theory of “unfair discrimination.”

Neill Averitt

The curious case of Hims & Hers

The Federal Trade Commission has sued lifestyle pharmaceutical marketer Hims & Hers on multiple charges, most involving its negative-option subscriptions. These charges seem valid, but the consumer harm is limited, raising the question of why this marginal case is being so tenaciously litigated...

Latest News

Nvidia’s Hugging Face openness pledge identifies US, EU antitrust fault line

Nvidia’s promise to preserve Hugging Face as an open, hardware-neutral platform anticipates what is likely to become the central issue in the antitrust reviews of its $12.93 billion acquisition:...

Groups call for FTC investigation into AI companies buying, destroying books

Sitting at his desk in his wood-paneled upstairs office in a Washington, DC-suburban warehouse, Allan Stypeck, a used-and-rare bookseller for 53 years, says he made his “first huge sale” to an...

Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern deal raises service concerns

Regulators reviewing Union Pacific Railroad’s proposed acquisition of Norfolk Southern may not be paying enough attention to the potential harms it will have on service.

Personalized pricing draws renewed FTC interest

The Federal Trade Commission is weighing a new enforcement policy for “personalized pricing,” a practice that uses consumer data to tailor prices to individual shoppers. 

Amazon faces suit from FTC, states over ad surcharge scheme

Amazon has been accused of secretly inflating prices in its search advertising auctions in a lawsuit from the Federal Trade Commission and 22 states.

KKR to pay record fine for serial HSR violations

Buyout firm KKR has agreed to pay a record $250 million penalty to settle government claims of violating merger filing rules.

people

Former enforcer Aitken settles into ABA role

Melanie Aitken, the new chair of the American Bar Association’s Antitrust Section, brings two unique characteristics to the job.