Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL) (NASDAQ:GOOG) dropped 5.90%, 5.86% or -$6.54, $6.56 to close the trading at $104.32, $105.31 following it hit intraday high level of $108.30, $105.31 in last trading session after a New York federal court has determined that an antitrust action filed by state attorneys general accusing Alphabet Inc.’s Google of monopolizing the technology underlying internet advertising may proceed.
Judge P. Kevin Castel ruled Tuesday that the majority of the states’ antitrust action may proceed, while he dropped one allegation against Google. Google attempted to dismiss the case, claiming that all of the behavior targeted by the states is legal.
In 2020, the attorneys general of 16 states and Puerto Rico sued Google for monopolizing the advertising technology industry. The states, led by Texas, claimed that Google agreed into a secret agreement, dubbed Jedi Blue, to give Meta Platforms Inc. preferential treatment on the exchange it operates to purchase and sell internet advertisements. In exchange, the social media business abandoned plans to implement a new sort of technology that would have challenged Google’s stranglehold on online advertising.
Castel refuted the assertion, claiming that “there is nothing incomprehensible or odd” about the firms’ arrangement. The states also claimed that Google skewed the auctions performed on its platform in such a way that its own items almost invariably won. In re Google Digital Advertising Antitrust Litigation, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, case number 21-md-03010.
On the other side, Google has failed to appeal the European Commission’s €4 billion punishment for unjustly pushing its search engine on people’s phones. An EU court maintained the previous penalties, which was imposed after competition authorities determined Google violated competition regulations.
Investigators decided that Google had unjustly pushed smartphone manufacturers such as Samsung and Sony to make Google the default internet search engine on handsets using Google’s Android operating system.
Furthermore, Android handset manufacturers were required to install Google Chrome as the default web browser on their handsets if they wished to pre-load other programs such as the Google Play Store or Gmail.
Google expressed disappointment that the court did not entirely overturn the EU Commission’s judgment. And added, the android has created more choice for everyone, not less, and supports thousands of successful businesses in Europe and around the world.
