Amazon Loses Antitrust Ruling in Consumer ‘Fair Pricing’ Case

Amazon.com Inc. must face consumer antitrust litigation challenging “most favored nation"-style policies that have allegedly driven up the prices of “virtually all products offered for sale” online in the U.S., a federal judge in Seattle ruled.

Judge Richard A. Jones let the proposed class action move forward in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, where a group of consumers has accused Amazon of reinstituting its MFN rules—after pledging to abandon them—in the form of so-called “fair pricing” agreements.

Although some courts have signed off in the past on MFN-style price pacts, they were “distinct from the ...