Facebook To Face Antitrust Lawsuits For Monopoly This Week: Bloomberg

Facebook, Inc FB will face antitrust, federal and state lawsuits as early as this week on allegations of abusing its dominance and stifling competition, Bloomberg reports.

What Happened: Republican-led Federal Trade Commission and a group of state attorneys general led by Democrat Letitia James will be filing the lawsuits, according to Bloomberg’s sources.

Facebook will face the monopoly charge for the second time in less than two months. The Justice Department’s antitrust suit against Alphabet Inc’s GOOG GOOGL Google and the upcoming Facebook lawsuit mark the most significant monopoly cases filed in the U.S. in 20 years.

Facebook will face a regulatory attack for its ownership of Instagram and WhatsApp, a part of investigations that started last year.

Why It Matters: Facebook and Twitter Inc TWTR had become a target of outgoing President Donald Trump and Republican members for suppressing conservative voices. While the social media giants denied the charge, Trump had threatened to veto the defense bill if eliminating Section 230 was not a part of it.

As per Bloomberg, it will be up to Biden’s Justice Department to carry the Google case forward, but Facebook’s case will fall on President-elect Joe Biden’s FTC chairman pick if Trump appointee Joe Simons leaves the agency.

Separately, the Mark Zuckerberg-led social media giant is reportedly planning a series of initiatives that align with Biden’s top priorities. 

James is confident that the lawsuit will be a bipartisan matter and added that, “we look forward to the possibility of consolidating with the FTC.” 

Price Action: FB shares are down by 0.41% to $278.55 in the pre-market session on the last check Monday.

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