Chinese Fireworks Antitrust Suit Doomed for Lack of Tying

Chinese fireworks company Firstrans International Co. won dismissal of an antitrust suit after a judge found insufficient evidence tying fireworks purchases to the use of a particular shipping service.

Ding Yan Zhong, Firstrans’s owner, controls 70 percent of all Chinese fireworks imported to the U.S.

Companies can violate antitrust laws when they force consumers to bundle together distinct products and services. But the theories Fireworks Lady & Co. LLC’s would-be class suit rested on failed for a number of reasons, Judge Cormac Carney said April 23 for the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

Fireworks Lady didn’t ...