Antitrust

Champions for fair and competitive markets.

When corporations use their market power to hurt workers, consumers, investors or entrepreneurs, we fight back to ensure markets work for everyone.

When corporations use market power to harm workers, consumers, investors, or entrepreneurs, we fight back. We do this to ensure markets work for everyone.

Our team represents plaintiffs nationwide in complex antitrust class actions. We challenge monopolies, price-fixing, wage suppression, and other business practices that hurt competition. 

We have earned a sterling reputation as one of the most widely respected plaintiffs’ antitrust practices in the country. We are consistently recognized as one of the nation’s leading antitrust practices. Some of our honors include: 

  • Top-tier rankings in the Legal 500 
  • Recognition as a premier Plaintiffs’ Antitrust firm by Chambers USA 
  • Multiple Law360 Practice Group of the Year honors 

Our clients include pension funds, hospitals, small businesses, workers, and consumers. Our class action experience spans industries, including, among others: 

  • Agriculture 
  • Automotive 
  • Chemicals 
  • Healthcare 
  • Media and Entertainment 
  • Pharmaceuticals 
  • Tech

We don’t shy away from formidable opponents. Our antitrust attorneys have gone toe-to-toe with industry giants and won against the likes of Dow Chemical, Goldman Sachs, and Google.

A Powerful Antitrust Team

Our attorneys have helped shape the antitrust landscape. Many have served as judicial law clerks or worked in the Department of Justice and other agencies. Others have defense-side experience, giving us insight into opposing counsel’s playbook.  

Our team has a deep understanding of the industry-specific dynamics at the heart of antitrust claims. In developing our cases, we regularly work with world-class economists and other experts. 

Common Anticompetitive Conduct We Challenge

  • Price fixing and market allocation (cartel conduct): Agreements between competitors to artificially raise prices or divide markets instead of competing fairly.  
  • Wage suppression, no-poach, and monopsony agreements that impact workers: Illegal employer agreements among employers that keep wages down, limit worker mobility, or reduce competition for labor.  
  • Group boycotts and hub-and-spoke conspiracies: Coordinated refusals to do business designed to shut competitors out of the market.  
  • Monopolization (exclusive dealing, tying, predatory conduct): Conduct by a dominant company that uses unfair tactics to maintain or expand monopoly power.  
  • Pay-for-delay (reverse payment) settlements in pharmaceuticals: Brand-name drug companies paying to delay generics from entering the market to keep prices high.  
  • Tying/exclusive dealing: Collusive arrangements that force customers to buy unwanted products or limit their ability to choose alternatives. 

Billions in Recoveries

As lead or co-lead counsel in some of the nation’s most complex class actions, we have recovered billions of dollars in damages for injured plaintiffs. Examples include: 

  • In re Urethane Antitrust Litigation (Co-Lead Counsel – Price Fixing – Chemicals) 
    We achieved a record-setting recovery in this price-fixing class action. After settling with several defendants for $139 million, we went to trial against The Dow Chemical Company and obtained a $400 million jury verdict. After offsetting the prior settlements and trebling, the court entered $1.06 billion judgment against Dow. The case ultimately settled for $835 million while Dow’s petition for certiorari was pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. Total recovery for the class reached $974 million – nearly 250% of the jury’s damages finding. The verdict was the largest price-fixing jury verdict at the time and the largest jury verdict in 2013.   
  • Securities Lending Antitrust Litigation (Co-Lead Counsel – Group Boycott – Financial Markets) This groundbreaking certified class action alleges a group boycott by the world’s largest investment banks. Plaintiffs claim that the banks aimed to thwart the modernization of the $1.7 trillion stock loan market.  A historic $580 million cash settlement and significant injunctive relief reforms against defendants Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, UBS, JP Morgan, Credit Suisse, and EquiLend received final approval in 2024. Litigation against Bank of America continues. 
  • Electronic Books Antitrust Litigation (Co-Lead Counsel – Price-Fixing – Technology & Publishing) 
    We litigated this price-fixing class action together with the Department of Justice and attorneys general from 33 states and territories. It alleged that Apple and five of the six biggest publishers in the U.S. conspired to raise the price of e-books. The case culminated in a settlement of $560 million, including a settlement of $450 million with Apple shortly before trial.   
  • Jien, et al. v. Perdue Farms, Inc., et al. (Co-Lead Counsel – Wage Suppression – Agriculture) 
    We represented poultry plant workers in this putative antitrust class action alleging the nation’s largest chicken and turkey producers, including Perdue Farms Inc., Tyson Foods Inc., and others, conspired to suppress their compensation in violation of federal antitrust laws. The lawsuit, at the vanguard of the movement in antitrust law to protect workers, was based on an independent private factual investigation. The $398.05 million recovery is second largest antitrust labor class action ever and largest for lower-wage workers. 

Antitrust Frequently Asked Questions

What is the purpose of antitrust laws?

Antitrust laws—like the Sherman Act, Clayton Act, and FTC Act—promote competition to protect consumers, workers, and businesses. They deter monopoly power, collusion, and exclusionary tactics so that markets deliver fair prices, innovation, and open opportunities. 

What is an antitrust lawsuit?

An antitrust lawsuit is a type of civil action – a lawsuit to enforce rights or resolve disputes among private parties. An antitrust lawsuit alleges anticompetitive behavior. Plaintiffs can seek an injunction (a court order for an entity to do something or stop doing something) and damages (a cash award) under federal or state antitrust laws. 

What is an antitrust investigation?

A government antitrust investigation probes potential violations using tools like criminal grand jury subpoenas or Civil Investigative Demands. Government investigations may result in criminal charges, consent decrees, or civil enforcement. They often run in parallel with private class actions seeking compensation for those harmed. 

What do antitrust lawyers do?

Antitrust attorneys investigate and litigate conduct that can hinder market competition. Price fixing, wage suppression, group boycotts, monopolization, and pay‑for‑delay deals are all types of anticompetitive conduct. Our attorneys analyze markets and economic evidence, work with experts, coordinate with government agencies, and pursue lawsuits to recover damages and stop unlawful practices. 

Current Cases

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UFC MMA Fighters Antitrust Litigation

Cung Le, et al. v. Zuffa, LLC, d/b/a Ultimate Fighting Championship (D. Nev.): Cohen Milstein is co-lead counsel in this certified wage suppression class action, representing mixed martial arts (MMA) fighters who allege that UFC unlawfully monopolized the MMA market by, among other things, locking up fighters in exclusive contracts and acquiring MMA rivals. On February 6, 2025, the court granted final approval of a historic $375 million settlement against UFC – exclusively for the MMA fighters in the Le class action. Two class actions on behalf of, among others, current fighters for the UFC continue.

In re Lipitor Antitrust Litigation

In re Lipitor Antitrust Litigation (D.N.J.): Plaintiffs allege that Pfizer, the manufacturer of the cholesterol drug Lipitor, the best-selling drug in pharmaceutical history, conspired with Ranbaxy, the generic manufacturer, to delay its introduction of a generic Lipitor product. On October 1, 2024, the Court granted final approval of a $35 million settlement against Pfizer for its role in the alleged anticompetitive scheme. Litigation against Ranbaxy is ongoing. Cohen Milstein is Co-Lead Counsel to the End-Payor Plaintiffs class.

Ideker Farms, Inc., et al. v. United States of America (NW Missouri Flood Litigation)

Ideker Farms, et al. v. United States of America (Fed. Cl.): Cohen Milstein represents Ideker Farms and more than 400 other plaintiffs located in six states along the Missouri River in a landmark mass action lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. The plaintiffs allege that the federal government took land and flooding easements over lands owned by farmers without compensation in violation of the takings clause of the Fifth Amendment. Cohen Milstein has helped lead the litigation team, including during a months-long liability trial in 2017, and a subsequent damages trial in 2020 for bellwether plaintiffs. In December 2020, the Court ruled largely in favor of bellwether plaintiffs. In June 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit concurred with the lower court and reversed and remanded the issues of compensation for lost crops and 2011 flooding to the lower court to determine valuation.

Past Cases

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Allen et al v. Dairy Farmers of America

Allen et al v. Dairy Farmers of America, Inc. et al (D. Vt.): Cohen Milstein served as Lead Counsel for one of two subclasses of dairy farmers challenging anticompetitive conduct in the Northeast which resulted in lower prices paid to farmers. In April 2017 the Second Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a $50 million settlement between plaintiffs and the remaining defendants, bringing the total settlement to more than $80 million, in addition to industry-changing equitable relief.

In re Google LLC Street View Electronic Communications Litigation

In re Google LLC Street View Electronic Communications Litigation (N.D. Cal.): Cohen Milstein was co-lead counsel in a nationwide class action alleging that Google violated the Wiretap Act when its Street View vehicles secretly collected payload data from unencrypted Wi-Fi networks. Plaintiffs defeated a motion to dismiss raising novel Wiretap Act issues, and the ruling was affirmed on interlocutory appeal to the Ninth Circuit. The court approved a $13 million settlement on March 18, 2020.

In re Electronic Books Antitrust Litigation

In re Electronic Books Antitrust Litigation (S.D.N.Y.): Cohen Milstein was co-lead counsel in a certified price-fixing class action against Apple and five leading U.S. publishers for conspiring to raise the retail prices of e-books. In addition to achieving class certification, the Cohen Milstein team defeated motions to exclude the class expert and successfully moved to exclude most of Apple’s expert testimony. The five publishing defendants settled for $166 million and Apple settled for $450 million, shortly before trial, bringing total settlements to $616 million. The settlement resolves damages claims brought by not only ebook purchasers, but also the U.S. Department of of Justice and attorneys general from 33 U.S. states and territories.