Meta To Soon Pay First EU Antitrust Fine For Linking Marketplace And Facebook

Meta To Soon Pay First EU Antitrust Fine For Linking Marketplace And Facebook

It might be slapped with a penalty of $13.4 billion or 10 percent of its 2023 global revenue

Meta Platforms will have to soon pay its first European Union antitrust fine for tying classified advertisements service marketplace with its social networking site Facebook.

The move by the European Commission comes more than a year-and-a-half after it accused the US tech giant of giving Facebook Marketplace an unfair advantage by bundling the two services together.

The competition watchdog also accused Meta of abusing its dominance by unilaterally imposing unfair trading conditions on competing online classified ads services that advertise on Facebook or Instagram.

Meta might pay $13.4 billion as a fine or 10 percent of its 2023 global revenue, though EU sanctions are usually much lower.

The decision will be issued in September-October before EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager leaves office in November.

Meanwhile, Meta reiterated its previous comments.

Matt Pollard, the Meta spokesperson stated, "The claims made by the European Commission are without foundation. We continue to work constructively with regulatory authorities to demonstrate that our product innovation is pro-consumer and pro-competitive.”

Last year, the company sought to settle the EU investigation by curbing the use of competitors' advertising data for Facebook Marketplace. However, the EU enforcer rejected the concession. A similar offer was accepted by the UK competition regulator.