Amazon defeats the demand of shareholders on third -party sellers, the expansion of capacity

An American judge dismissed a lawsuit that accused Amazon of defrauding shareholders about their treatment of external vendors and plans to expand the capacity, which culminated in an antimonopoly case of the Federal Commission of Commerce against the online retail giant.

Monday's dismissal by the American district judge John Chun in Seattle was prejudice, which means that proposed collective claim cannot bring again.

The shareholders accused Amazon of hiding an algorithm that assured that their private label products cost less than external merchandise, increasing prices for consumers in general.

They also said that Amazon hid the overexpansion of its infrastructure and compliance network, which caused the price of their shares to fall in April 2022 when it incurred $ 2 billion of costs due to excess capacity and registered its first quarterly loss since 2015.

But the judge did not find “convincing and particularized” facts to suggest that executives knew and covered Amazon's assumption that favors their own products about those of external sellers, or believed that their expansion was too aggressive.

Chun also found insufficient accusations that Amazon officials, including former executive president Jeff Bezos, and his successor Andy Jassy intended to disappoint them “causing Amazon to seem as successful as possible”, to increase his payment and sell shares at inflated prices.

“The most plausible inference” of the complaint, Chun wrote, “is that Amazon and the individual defendants used acute commercial practices and focused uniquely on increasing corporate profits.”

The FTC sued Amazon in September 2023, accusing him of using monopoly power to prevent other sellers from reduce prices, which makes consumers pay more and “degrade” the shopping experience.

Eighteen US states and Puerto Rico have joined the demand of the FTC. An unwry trial before Chun is scheduled for October 2026, as shown in the judicial records.

The demand for shareholders covered the owners of Amazon's shares from February 1, 2019 to April 28, 2022.