New record market cap for Facebook

The social media giant reached $1 trillion in market capitalization thanks to a favourable ruling from a federal court

Cases attempted by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and by 48 state attorneys general were dismissed on Monday. Facebook was sued in December 2020 on the grounds of engaging in a systematic strategy to eliminate threats to its monopoly, including the acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp. According to the federal court, the FTC failed to prove that Facebook holds monopoly power in the US personal social networking market.

“The Complaint is undoubtedly light on specific factual allegations regarding consumer-switching preferences,” the court wrote. “These allegations — which do not even provide an estimated actual figure or range for Facebook’s market share at any point over the past ten years — ultimately fall short of plausibly establishing that Facebook holds market power.”

Moreover, on the parallel case from the state attorneys general, the long delay between the purchases of the two companies and the 2020 case filing was unprecedented at a state level.

After the news hit the wires, Facebook stock price traded more than 4% higher at $355.64. It became the fifth US company to reach such a milestone, following the likes of Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet.

Source: cnn.com