DOJ, States Reach Significant Settlement In Agri Stats Information Sharing Antitrust Litigation

The Department of Justice Antitrust Division (DOJ) and a bipartisan group of six state attorneys general announced last week a proposed settlement that provides important guidance on how federal and state antitrust enforcers evaluate information exchanges. In many cases, information exchanges are alleged to be evidence of an underlying illegal agreement, such as to fix prices. But the focus in United States et al. v. Agri Stats, Inc. is on alleged anticompetitive effects from exchanges of information themselves, which has been a rare theory for the agencies to pursue. As such, the proposed settlement (which the court must approve) provides important guidance for businesses and likely provides insight into how the federal agencies will treat information exchanges in expected forthcoming guidance regarding collaborations between competitors.