{"id":277569,"date":"2026-04-20T23:05:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T23:05:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/277569\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T23:05:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T23:05:09","slug":"amazon-fixed-prices-by-forcing-other-retailers-to-raise-prices-on-top-brands-ca-claims-in-unsealed-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/277569\/","title":{"rendered":"Amazon Fixed Prices By Forcing Other Retailers To Raise Prices On Top Brands, CA Claims In Unsealed Records"},"content":{"rendered":"

SACRAMENTO, CA \u2014 A bombshell court filing by California’s Justice Department alleges online retail giant Amazon engaged in price fixing by pressuring companies to ask competing retailers to increase prices on certain products, the New York Times reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The document is part of a court filing unsealed Monday from California’s ongoing lawsuit against the world’s biggest online retailer. <\/p>\n

In 2022, the state sued Amazon<\/a> in San Francisco Superior Court, accusing Amazon’s practices of hurting competition, saying it increases prices that consumers pay online. The lawsuit, which is scheduled to go to trial next year, claimed Amazon punished sellers on its marketplace for offering lower prices on other websites.<\/p>\n

According to the newly unsealed, 16-page filing, Amazon asked brands like Levi’s and Hanes to get involved when the retailer noticed a competitor\u2019s lower price or money was being lost on an item for sale, the NY Times reported.<\/p>\n

According to Bonta, who filed the antitrust and unfair competition lawsuit against Amazon, the company violated California\u2019s Unfair Competition Law and Cartwright Act.<\/p>\n

Officials said the lawsuit demonstrates how Amazon\u2019s pricing practices have allowed it to expand and entrench the company\u2019s enormous market power as an online retail store, impede fair market competition, and impose prices above normal competitive levels, costing consumers worldwide.<\/p>\n

Bonta recently filed a separate request for a preliminary injunction after the discovery process uncovered substantial evidence that Amazon, through its vendors, agreed to increase and fix the prices of products on Amazon and other retail websites to protect and bolster Amazon\u2019s profits.<\/p>\n

Last week, Bonta defeated Amazon\u2019s effort to dismiss the lawsuit<\/a>on the basis that California\u2019s antitrust laws did not reach Amazon\u2019s anticompetitive conduct. <\/p>\n

The unsealed documents include internal emails, deposition testimony and confidential information that Bonta obtained as part of the lawsuit.<\/p>\n

The Guardian<\/a> reported on Monday it had obtained and reviewed evidence, which has been filed in San Francisco county superior court but has been made publicly yet. Previously redacted information has now been revealed, though a judge allowed some redactions to remain, per Amazon\u2019s request.<\/p>\n

“Amazon has called the claims in the lawsuit entirely false and misguided,” the Guardian reported.<\/p>\n

\u201cAmazon is consistently identified as America\u2019s lowest-priced online retailer, and it is ironic that the attorney general seeks to have us feature higher prices in ways that would harm consumers and competition,\u201d the company said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Mayer Handler, owner of a clothing company called Leveret, testified in one of the previously-redacted depositions labeled “highly confidential” that he received an email in October 2022 from Amazon informing him one of his items was “no longer eligible to be a featured offer” through Amazon\u2019s Buy Box.<\/p>\n

In the documents, Handler testified that Amazon had suppressed the item because his company was selling it for $19.99 on Amazon \u2014 one cent higher than the amount his company was offering the product for on Walmart. He testified that his company changed the price of the item on Walmart to match or exceed Amazon’s price, or changed the item’s product code in an attempt to throw off the e-commerce giant’s price tracking system.<\/p>\n

According to Bonta, Amazon removed the “Add to Cart” and “Buy Now” buttons \u2014 for products that don’t comply with Amazon\u2019s price fixing. The court found that Amazon could not demonstrate that the practice is legal or procompetitive, officials said. <\/p>\n

This argument represented a significant aspect of Amazon\u2019s defense, and it lost on all points. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis victory is a key update in this case and sends a clear message to current and future behemoth corporations: The California Department of Justice will not allow consumers to be cheated,\u201d said Bonta. \u201cWhile consumers face a crisis of affordability, there is no room for anticompetitive pricing practices that impede free market competition and raise prices for consumers. My office is committed to protecting fair competition and encouraging innovation; we will not stand by idly when powerful companies seek to manipulate the market for their own gains. Consumers and small businesses deserve justice, and today we\u2019re happy to deliver it once more.\u201d<\/p>\n

The preliminary injunction will be heard on July 23, 2026, and trial is set for January 19, 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SACRAMENTO, CA \u2014 A bombshell court filing by California’s Justice Department alleges online retail giant Amazon engaged in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277570,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[121,123,122],"class_list":["post-277569","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277569","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277569"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277569\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}