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Alibaba antitrust investigation: Beijing slaps e-commerce giant with record US$2.8 billion fine in landmark case
- The fine surpassed the previous record imposed on Qualcomm in 2015
- Regulators stressed that the fine imposed is for the healthy development of China’s internet economy
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China’s antitrust regulators slapped a record fine on one of the country’s largest technology conglomerates, closing a months-long investigation that began last Christmas Eve and setting the precedent for the government to use anti-monopoly rules to regulate the country’s Big Tech.
Alibaba Group Holding, the world’s largest e-commerce company and owner of this newspaper, was fined 18.2 billion yuan (US$2.8 billion) by the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR).
The Hangzhou-based company “abused its dominant market position in China’s online retail platform service market since 2015 by forcing online merchants to open stores or take part in promotions on its platforms,” compelling the market to “pick one from two” in a breach of the country’s anti-monopoly law, the regulator said on Saturday.
Alibaba was ordered to correct its misconduct, and pay a fine equivalent to 4 per cent of its total 2019 revenue. The fine was nearly three times the 6.1 billion yuan penalty paid by Qualcomm, the world’s largest supplier of mobile chips, in 2015.
According to China’s anti-monopoly law, the Beijing regulator can fine Alibaba in a range of between 1 per cent and 10 per cent of its annual revenue, which was 455.71 billion yuan in 2019. The regulator said it decided to fine Alibaba the equivalent of 4 per cent of annual revenue after factoring in the “duration and degree” of the misconduct, as well as Alibaba’s “in-depth self-examination” and “proactive rectification”.
Josh joined the Post in 2016 to cover politics and business in mainland China and Hong Kong. Since 2018, he has covered China's emerging tech sector. Having graduated from the University of Pittsburgh with a degree in English and philosophy, he is now pursuing a master's degree in law at the University of Hong Kong.
Jane Zhang joined the Post in 2017, working with the video team before moving to reporting. She covers business and political stories in Hong Kong and mainland China. Previously, Jane interned at CNN and Bloomberg Businessweek Chinese.
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