Author: Jon Cieslak Many guitarists and rock music fans have recently gotten to know Rick Beato. Beato is a musician, music producer, and, most recently, a YouTube personality. He regularly produces YouTube videos about a variety of music topics, headlined by his most well-known series, What Makes This Song Great?,…
Author: Luis Blanquez Interesting times to be an attorney; especially an antitrust attorney. If you work in private practice, you are likely witnessing the most significant transformation in the legal sector in the past 20 years. If you are an in-house lawyer, you are probably dealing with a new set…
Author: Jarod Bona You might wonder why industry trade associations can lobby the government without obvious antitrust sanction, even when—which is common—they seek regulations or actions that ultimately harm competition. (By the way, if you are invited to a trade association meeting, you should read this.) The answer is found…
Authors: Luke Hasskamp and Aaron Gott This article briefly explores the applicability of federal antitrust laws to actions taken by municipalities or other state subdivisions and, specifically, whether they have acted pursuant to a clearly articulated state policy to displace competition in the marketplace. Federal antitrust laws are designed to…
Author: Jarod Bona In many instances, conduct involving the business of insurance is, indeed, exempt from antitrust liability. So why does insurance sometimes get a free pass? In 1945, Congress passed a law called The McCarran-Ferguson Act. Insurance, of course, has traditionally been regulated by the States. Territorial and jurisdictional disputes…
Author: Steven J. Cernak Recently, I was researching antitrust developments in 2020 to update my Antitrust in Distribution and Franchising book. While there were several developments last year, what struck me was the large number of potentially drastic changes to antitrust distribution law that started to play out in 2020…
Author: Jon Cieslak Over a year after it was first passed by the Senate, the Criminal Antitrust Anti-Retaliation Act finally became law in December 2020. The new law protects employees who report criminal antitrust violations such as price fixing or bid rigging from retaliation. The Act states that an employer…
Authors: Kristen Harris and Steven J. Cernak As we covered earlier (see here and here), the recent U.S. House Judiciary Committee Majority Report on its Investigation into Digital Markets recommends that Congress override several classic antitrust cases. In particular, the Report recommends “clarifying that cases involving platforms do not require…
photo credit: ginnerobot via photopin cc Author: Jarod Bona Antitrust injury is one of the most commonly fought battles in antitrust litigation. It is also one of the least understood antitrust concepts. No matter what your antitrust theory, it is almost certain that you must satisfy antitrust-injury requirements to win…
Author: Jarod Bona Just because your company isn’t based in the United States doesn’t mean it can ignore US antitrust law. In this interconnected world, there is a good chance that if you produce something, the United States is a market that matters to your company. For that reason, I…