The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) finalized its consent decree with Visa and Mastercard yesterday. Late last year, the Antitrust Division of the DOJ filed suit against Visa and Mastercard saying that their anti-competitive and deceptive credit card pricing policies were in violation of the Sherman Act and thanks to the DOJ’s rulings merchants will now be able to offer consumers discounts between cards and force the cards to compete on cost.
“The United States has carefully considered the various questions and suggestions contained in the comments and continues to believe that the proposed Final Judgment will provide an effective and appropriate remedy for the antitrust violations alleged in the Amended Complaint [against MasterCard and Visa]”, stated the DOJ.
The Merchants Payments Coalition, commented on yesterday’s announcement by saying, “Merchants across the country applaud the Department of Justice for recognizing Visa and MasterCard’s anti-competitive actions and moving forward with its litigation. The initial consent decree released in October and today's settlement reinforce Congress’ efforts to rein in the anti-competitive fees and provide a useful complement to the pending swipe fee reforms that address debit cards. While the congressional reforms address debit cards, this much-needed action is an important first step towards correcting anti-competitive practices in the credit card market.
“Unfortunately, based on past experience, merchants expect that Visa and MasterCard will continue doing everything possible to hide their prices, prevent full competition and continue the bad acts that drew antitrust action in the first place — regardless of the terms of the settlement…
“Merchants across the country look forward to continued investigations of Visa and MasterCard’s anti-competitive practices by the Department of Justice so that business owners and their customers will have a fully competitive system in the future.”
As always, stay tuned to Credit Card Professor for more credit card news and updates.
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