In early 2017, the Yale Law Journal published a paper entitled “Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox” written by a then-unknown law student at the university, Lina Khan. The paper’s novel analysis of Amazon’s effect on competition—which went against the grain of conventional views about antitrust enforcement—helped influence the growing regulatory scrutiny of Amazon.
The scrutiny may finally come to a head soon. The Wall Street Journal reported this week that the European Union’s competition authority is preparing to file antitrust charges against Amazon as early as next week. It is likely to drill down on Amazon’s use of data to compete with third-party merchants who sell through the company’s online marketplace. Federal antitrust regulators in the U.S. are probing Amazon as well, as is the California attorney general, the Journal reported Friday.
