Japan's Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) raided the offices of four major ice cream manufacturers on Tuesday, accusing them of colluding to fix wholesale prices of luxury tubs and cones. The targets include Unilever’s local subsidiary, Meiji, Morinaga, and Glico. It is alleged that between 2021 and 2023, executives from these firms held secret meetings in Tokyo hotels to agree on price hikes of 5-10% for premium products sold to convenience stores and supermarkets.
The JFTC believes the cartel aimed to offset rising raw ingredient costs, but regulators argue that coordination broke competition law. The raids sent shockwaves through Tokyo’s Nikkei, with shares of Meiji and Morinaga falling sharply by 3.2% and 4.
1% respectively. Meanwhile, London’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has announced it will review parallels in the UK ice cream market. This comes after a 2022 OFT report flagged suspicious pricing patterns among major brands.
The CMA is now scrutinising whether British consumers are paying over the odds for their Magnums and Cornettos. The news has reignited debate over corporate greed versus legitimate cost pass-through. As a long-time observer of markets, I find this case emblematic of a broader trend: when inflation is high, companies have an irresistible temptation to treat price coordination as a liquidity buffer.
But market efficiency is not about protecting corporate margins; it is about allowing the invisible hand to allocate capital without restraint. Japan’s bold move should serve as a warning to any London-listed executive who thinks the City’s watchdogs are asleep. The bottom line: if you are caught colluding, expect your margins to be frozen.
