Amazon's Anti-Discounting Avengers Overwhelm Competition

4. Amazon combines its various anti-discounting programs to maximize their collective anticompetitive effect

338. Amazon uses all of its various anti-discounting programs—and the combined power of its Marketplace and Retail arms—to limit price competition and comparison shopping for the hundreds of billions of dollars in goods sold annually in the relevant markets. This suppression of price competition and comparison shopping also artificially contributes to converting more shoppers into Prime subscribers.

339. Amazon’s seller-disciplining tactics and first-party anti-discounting algorithm are each powerful on their own (as explained in Parts VI.A.2.c and VI.A.3.b, respectively), but the whole of their combined anticompetitive impact is significantly greater than the sum of their individual effects.

340. In 2016, Amazon used various elements of its anti-discounting strategy to hamstring (redacted) a new online superstore that planned to compete against Amazon by offering shoppers and sellers lower prices. Amazon feared that (redacted) Amazon predicted that (redacted) In Amazon’s estimation (redacted)

341. Amazon responded to (redacted) launch by activating the combined might of its Marketplace and Retail businesses. With respect to the Marketplace business, Amazon (redacted) On the Retail front, (redacted)

342. The combined force of Amazon’s anti-discounting schemes worked. Less than three months after (redacted) launched, (redacted) was forced to (redacted)

343. More recently, Amazon used the same combination of its anti-discounting strategies to target (redacted) a potential entrant to the online superstore market specializing in homeware, children’s products, and women’s clothing. Until recently, (redacted) primary strategy was to offer shoppers deep discounts on various products during limited time “flash sales.” (redacted) endeavored to offer the “lowest price online” during those sales. This meant beating Amazon’s prices.

344. In late 2019, (redacted) rolled out a (redacted) initiative that displayed its lower price alongside the higher prices of identical products on Amazon or Walmart.com. This is a classic form of price competition that should flourish in a competitive market.

345. To Amazon, this price competition was intolerable—and so it set out to destroy it. (redacted) In 2019, for example, Amazon’s estimated U.S. sales volume was approximately 100 times greater than (redacted)

346. Amazon activated its Marketplace arm against (redacted) by punishing sellers. Its seller punishments quickly stopped many (redacted) suppliers that were also Amazon sellers from offering lower prices on (redacted)

347. Amazon also swung its Retail business into action, applying its first-party anti-discounting algorithm to (redacted)

348. After Amazon began using the combined force of its Marketplace and Retail anti-discounting strategies (redacted)

349. Facing the full brunt of Amazon’s anti-discounting conduct, (redacted) After a few months, (redacted)

350. In sum, Amazon’s monopolistic anti-discounting conduct blocks critical avenues of competition in both relevant markets through its anti-discounting practices. Amazon’s conduct denies rivals scale, stifles innovation, deadens price competition, reduces output, and deprives the American public of lower prices.