€798 million fine works: Meta to open Facebook Marketplace to competitors

Meta✴ has announced that it will allow European ad services to list their ads on Facebook✴ Marketplace for a fee based on how many times users click on the ads. The move comes as the company seeks to comply with an EU antitrust rule that has resulted in a €798 million fine, Bloomberg reports.

Image source: Solen Feyissa / Unsplash

In November, the EU’s antitrust regulator ordered Meta✴ to stop linking its classified ads service to Facebook✴ and to refrain from imposing unfair trading conditions on rival second-hand goods platforms. The European Commission said it was “currently assessing whether Meta✴ has fully complied with the decision.”

However, Facebook✴ said in a statement that despite the changes, the company still disagrees with the European Commission’s decision last year that penalized Meta✴ for abusing its dominant position. The company also echoed previous comments by Meta✴ CEO Mark Zuckerberg, calling the EU fines “the equivalent of a tariff regime.”

Recall that the fine that accompanied the EU order was one of the last actions of the former head of the EU antitrust agency, Margrethe Vestager, under whose leadership the Brussels regulator imposed multi-billion-dollar fines on major American tech companies, including more than €8 billion in fines on Google, which is owned by the Alphabet holding company.

It is noteworthy that the UK Competition and Markets Authority was also investigating Facebook✴ Marketplace. However, the UK regulator decided to accept Meta✴’s concessions and declined to pursue the matter further.