RAM Manufacturers Fined for Price Fixing 216
TufelKinder writes "From Law.com: 'In the largest fine ever obtained by San Francisco antitrust prosecutors, a Korean company has agreed to plead guilty and pay $185 million for its role in a conspiracy to drive up the price of computer chips.' Micron and Infineon have also been fined for their role in the scheme." From the article: "It's the third-largest fine of its kind in the United States, and it could be just a preview of even bigger penalties. The far-reaching computer chip investigation, which alleges wrongdoing from 1999 through 2002, affects thousands of consumers."
this wasn't a class action (Score:4, Informative)
There have been additional claass action suits filed, which will make the ambulance chasers, err, plaintiff's lawyers, wealthy while producing almost nothing for the customers.
hawk
Re:give it back! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Thanks a lot.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Price Fixing... (Score:3, Informative)
Don't forget - the devaluation of the American dollar.
Even though oil is officially priced in US dollars, that does not make its pricing tied to the value of the dollar. Since oil has intrinsic value, if the value of the US dollar goes down, the price of oil must go up so as to roughly maintain value parity.
Re:US retailers (Score:3, Informative)
Well, here's what Dell did [tinyurl.com]. My guess is that most just paid up, or took Dell's route and closed certain models and re-released. It looks like Apple actually raised the price of a few models to compensate.
A good deal of them actually just side-stepped the companies altogether after some time. A few million is pocket change to a company like Hynix with a market cap of 5.8 billion. They'll just release a few hundred thousand new shares or so. Doesn't look like their stock price [tinyurl.com] has been affected at all. Up 4.99% today.
Awesome! (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Price Fixing... (Score:3, Informative)
The things I can think of that are going up in price these days are:
- Food
- Petrol
- Automobiles
- Housing
- Other luxury items
With the exception of the first two (food and fuel), everything else is an extremely high-ticket item that you buy very rarely. The day-to-day cost of living expenses like cheap manufactured goods, clothing, etc. have been tending to decrease in price as we find more third-world countries to exploit^w^w^w^w^w^wcome up with newer, more automated means of production to reduce the cost.The cost of electronics is the most extreme example, showing a very severe downward trend, but this deflation applies to other things as well. All that sweat-shop clothing has driven textiles way down. Chinese knock-offs are starting to really cut the prices on random non-electronic equipment---I bought a precision torque wrench for $12 that would have cost $60 ten or fifteen years ago, and a Chinese-made ribbon mic for less than the cost of a replacement ribbon for a vintage ribbon mic....
I'm not saying everything is going down, but I would say the majority of things are, from what I've seen. The ones that aren't are either things that can't be reasonably manufactured overseas and imported (food, beverages, fuel) or are situations where the supply is being artificially stifled to drive up prices (fuel again, automobiles, housing).....
Parentheses mean a LOSS (Score:3, Informative)
Better look at those numbers again. Hynix's net LOSS [hoovers.com] was $7.5 billion over that time period.
Re:$185M sounds like a lot, but... (Score:3, Informative)
Hynix: lost $7.5 billion
Micron: lost $2.8 billion
Infineon: lost $2 billion
Elpida: no net profit data available
Samsung: who knows? They make every dang thing in the world. They don't lose money, but I'd bet that they didn't make any from memory back then.
Anyway, draw your own conclusions...
Re:Close... (Score:3, Informative)
And if we don't, as the price of crude continues to rise alternative energy sources will become more economically feasible and attract greater investment.
You'll notice a common thread: It is environmental activism that is really causing the most significant increase in your gas prices. Get rid of that and you can enjoy your sweet nectar for a more reasonable price. And remember: The purpose of the environmentalists wackos is not to fix the environment, but to shut down our economy and destroy our capitalism.
Wow - way to go FUD-Master! You should see if Microsoft or the RIAA is hiring....
No, environmentalists are not out to "destroy our capitalism." At its economic heart, environmental regulations seek to minimize externalities [wikipedia.org] You can build a refinery, but that refinery is going to cause air pollution, water/ground-water contamination, and environmental degradation. It's going to affect the plants and the animals in the immediate area as well as downwind or downstream. It's going to cause health problems for people.
TANSTAAFL - if you're going to build a refinery, you've got to pay for all of these damages you are going to cause, or pay to prevent them. Gov't regulations are one mechanism to force you to do that, because you're not going to do it out of the "goodness" of your profit-seeking capitalistic heart.
I hope gas prices keep going up, and that creative entrepreneurs in this country find new ways to generate and conserve energy in a profitable way. These are your true capitalists - not Exxon Mobil, Shell, and BP.