Egg Price-Fixing Conspiracy Claims Rejected by Appeals Court

A failed class action alleging an industry-wide scheme to fix egg prices through “animal welfare” measures was properly tried under the rule of reason, which asks whether the restrictions were reasonable overall, the Third Circuit ruled Monday, rejecting a “per se” approach.

“Confronted with practices having far less certain motives and far more complicated economic consequences” than a naked price-fixing conspiracy, the district judge “quite rightly” applied the rule of reason, Judge Kent A. Jordan wrote for the court.

The antitrust lawsuit accused top egg producers of adopting the animal welfare program through their trade groups as a pretext for ...