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EU Issues Largest Antitrust Fine to Date for CRT TV Price Fixing
hankwang writes "The European commission fined a number manufacturers for pricing fixing of cathode ray tubes in the period between 1996 and 2005. The total fine was EUR 1.47 billion (USD 1.92 billion), for Philips, LG Electronics, Samsung SDI, and three other firms. According to the European Commission: 'For almost 10 years, the cartelists carried out the most harmful anti-competitive practices including price fixing, market sharing, customer allocation, capacity and output coordination and exchanges of commercial sensitive information. The cartelists also monitored the implementation, including auditing compliance with the capacity restrictions by plant visits in the case of the computer monitor tubes cartel.'"
Politicians don't have better things to worry about?
How does this actually help someone who's bought a TV or monitor during this time? Most people probably won't have the receipts for these TVs or monitors now, and in many cases have probably already thrown them out or given them away to make room for an LCD replacement...
I'd be curious if this is actually meaning something, or just a drop in the bucket.
Doesn't sound like a meaningful amount to me, but I may be wrong and profits may have been already pretty low.
At least they don't let them get away completely without anything. I am no big fan of the EU, but at least the stream news about them of actually suing and fining companies for shit they do is a small positive note I can't deny. (Depending on the truth of the news of course.)
What would it take for us Americans to get a government that favors individuals over corporations? Perhaps a new
Supreme Court? The current one seems to think that corporations are people.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Take all their profits from selling CRT:s. And LCD:s since they have been convicted in that area as well.
The consumer will pay the fines in higher prices. Take the boards and the CEOs responsible to jail if you want to make a dent in this, all the fines will do is tack on a fine tax to their products. Thanks.
So this is what now? The 4th price fixing cartel spanning the late 90s and early 2000s that Samsung has been a part of? But since they make Android phones we'll just ignore that while painting Apple as evil, right?
Why is everything settled with money? Pussies.
Invalidate their key patents in EU, jail their major shareholders, deny import and sale of their and their affiliates' products, sell their assets in EU take their money and forbid them from operating in EU, ...
We can expect an similar fine 10-15 years from now for flat panel price fixing? AWESOME!!!!
Has the EU ever levied these kinds of fines against countries that are based in Europe? Their actions often seem like protectionism masquerading as consumer protection.
The EU has many issues, but prosecution of anti-competitive behavior is one of the areas where they shine. I bought a big Philips 'flatscreen' (i.e. the front is flat, it sticks out half a meter on the backside) for around 1200 euro circa 2001, so can I now claim some of my money back? (Related bonus question, since this is Slashdot: A somewhat obsolute piece of electronics weighing 50 kg is collecting dust in my living room. It is still working perfectly, but has only scart and analog coax inputs. Resolution is also on the low side, it is not HD. Any useful project it can be used for, other than throwing it out of the window to kill my neighbour's cat?)
karma police: arrest this man, he talks in maths; he buzzes like a fridge, he's like a detuned radio. [radiohead]
I want the New York Times, the media corporation, to have free speech.
All the people that work the the Times do have free speech so in principle you already have what you want. You just don't want to limit the individual's right to free speech because it happens under the aegis of a corporation.
By the time the government does something, the market's already moved beyond it. Even the original grandaddy of antitrust, the Standard Oil monopoly, was only a shadow of its former self by the time the government took action. Its marketshare had been slashed in its strongest East and Midwest markets, and it was a minority in the Gulf and Western markets.
Take the boards and the CEOs responsible to jail if you want to make a dent in this, all the fines will do is tack on a fine tax to their products.
Do you seriously think there would be no negative consequences from making company officers personally liable for the actions of the company regardless of whether they personally were the cause? The ENTIRE reason corporations exist is to shield the shareholders and employees of the company from many forms of personal liability. Without this shield much of modern commerce would not be possible because the risk would simply be too high. Even if they were willing to accept the risk, prices of their products would have to be higher to absorb the higher levels of risk. Company officers would be liable for the actions of other people that they cannot possibly hope to control completely.
There are circumstances where the corporate veil can be pierced (and rightfully so) but we need to be extremely cautious about when and how. Sure you could "solve" fraud problems in the manner you propose but unless you are very careful and put significant limits on the personal liability, you would almost certainly kill the corporation in the process.
Take the fines in the form of equity. It hits the owners (shareholders) by diluting their equity. And with enough equity, the government can become an activist shareholder and move around a few managers or set pay.
Governments have significant conflicts of interest and are generally not well equipped to manage corporations. If you are a competitor to a company that has the government as a shareholder, you can easily find yourself in a very bad situation because it is no longer a level playing field. The government can change the laws to favor the company they own.
Look how GM and the banks screamed when the bailout was given in the form of equity.
The government did not take an equity stake in most banks. They did give them some loan covenants which the banks were not happy about but frankly who cares about that? There are always going to be people complaining about anything that doesn't completely favor them financially. GM did not scream about giving up an equity stake because that was obviously going to be part of the terms. You rescue a company from death and you expect a say in what it does until you recoup your investment. The alternative was liquidation of GM plus most of their supply base and probably Ford and Chrysler as well since they share suppliers. Even Toyota said that GM being liquidated would be a grave problem for them. The government pretty much had to take an equity stake to ensure performance and the only reason they still have one is because they are hoping to not take a big loss for the taxpayers in the process.
Point is, I want the NY Times product - the newspaper - to have very broad speech protections, probably almost the same protection afforded to the individual employees.
A corporation is a fictional entity. It is merely an association of individuals. Nothing wrong with that at all but a corporation by definition has no voice of its own. It's like a puppet, it only can say what the person controlling it wants it to say and the person controlling it already has free speech rights. The important bit is to make sure we don't limit the speech of individuals by limiting the corporation. (basically I'm agreeing with you) The solution SCOTUS came up with to solve this dilemma was to declare that a corporation was functionally identical (or nearly so) to a person which is clever but probably not the best solution because there are critical differences between a puppet and the puppeteer. SCOTUS basically declared Pinocchio to be a real boy even though it is obvious to everyone that the puppet isn't actually a real person.
I don't care what others say - LCD's, LED's, and Plasma Panels just can't provide the softness and warmth of a CRT. They will never go out of style.
Don't mess with The Phone Company. Piss them off and you'll be using two tin cans and a piece of string.
No one asks you to read the article. But atleast the summary. The Phillips mentioned in the summary is based in Europe.
'cos, you know, I hear all the time about how the EU only fines US companies, therefore they must all be US, right?
The EU is just p*ssed off that the member countries refuse to pay for a budget hike of 8% next year. So instead the EU finds a scapegoat and collects their extra money this way. The consumers will see nothing in return.
To Terminate, or not to Terminate, that's the question - SCSIROB
They had to take action on CRTs, now essentially obsolete, for something which occurred during a 10 year period ending 7 years ago.
Couldn't they have found a current or a longer lasting cartel?
De Beers perhaps?
Or if that doesn't pass the "essential" test, how about OPEC?
I'm sure there are other candidates. But no. Like any other bully or mob, politicians pick on the weak and those who won't pay for protection.
Europe is not one jurisdiction, we are still 50 separate countries, and 27 of those are within the European Union.
Those 27 countries have their own legal systems from British Common Law to German Civil Law. The EU is only a "federal" framework, the nations rule themselves. There are various forms of suits and some have "class action" options (see the EU and Collective Redress). Our national courts are far less willing or able to hand out billions of Euros. Tort in Europe in general does not result in huge personal gains.
In my jurisdiction you can only sue for actual financial losses, that were caused by the action in question. Your feelings are worthless, your lost income will be compensated, but mostly by existing public/private insurance. The difference between those figures is what the wrongdoer ends up paying.
That fact works in our citizens' favor. You can't sue your doctor or employer and expect to become a millionaire for either your own stupidity or actual wrong doing. You can have someone justly punished for their errors, but it's not about rewarding people. Doctors insurance is a lot less costly in European countries. You will be taken care of however no matter what the outcome.
Obviously it's a bit different with monopolies and price fixing, but the fines will go towards financing schools and roads etc. That's more in line with how European societies are organized.
You're blaming the victim of a robbery for wanting compensation and some of his money returned?
What foolish logic! That's the same simple claim we always hear here. They're not free to increase their prices as they like! That's where competition comes in, and there are other companies out there that didn't get fined. They will gladly take your customers if you try to increase your prices. Your logic is faulty and you should feel bad.
I can think of several monopolist schemes that have been price fixing for years...
De Beers Diamond price fixing anyone?
OPEC Crude Oil price fixing?
Pfizer Pharma price fixing?
List goes on... Point is, why such a small segment?