LG, Sharp plead guilty to LCD price-fixing, take $585m fine
By Nilay Patel 
posted Nov 12th 2008 3:37PM
posted Nov 12th 2008 3:37PM
Allegations of LCD price-fixing have been swirling around for years now, and it looks like at least some of the companies involved have dirt on their hands -- LG, Sharp and Chunghwa Picture Tubes have all just pled guilty to price-fixing in a case filed by the US Department of Justice and will pay a combined $585m fine. LG's taking the biggest hit at $400m for conspiring to fix prices from September 2001 to June 2006, while Sharp's on the hook for $120m for jacking prices on panels sold to Dell, Motorola and Apple during the same time frame. Naughty, naughty. It also sounds like this plea agreement is more than just a sterile attempt to cut losses -- Sharp's exec staff is taking a 10 to 30 percent pay cut for three months as punishment to reassure its shareholders. Sounds like a plan -- how about refunding some of that cash to us chumps out here buying your overpriced products?
Executives getting hit in the pocketbooks for bad decisions? What a concept! Hey, Wall Street, are you listening?
I wonder how much the profited (net profit) on the sales for which these fines are based upon.
Did any of that money go to the consumers or businesses that bought the items?
I wonder when the prices of LCD's will come down, spcially with OLEDs around the corner and they will be printed dirt cheap but then probably sold at a 1000 times more then they are worth because of the high MSRP of LEDs