Now I don't even think I have 1 single wrinkle in my smooth brain but I can still see the bullshit right in front of me. I mean when it smells like shit and looks like shit it must be shit right?
IMO what needs to happen is representation for the retail investor. Let me make a case point for the argument sake. With the pandemic going on what types of business where able to evade political theater and stay open in full force? It was business that have lobbyist and a real voice / influence at the table. I could go on but let's refocus.
Something needs to happen here as we keep relying on government to come in and slap the wrist of the Melvin's alike, but only to realize that apart of doing business is paying fines and or settling out of court cases. We can not let what happened in 2008 happen again and let this crooks get away with these crimes that hurt everyday people.
One thing that got brought up to me was that every broker has a compliance department. How do we contact this compliance team and make these reports, or is it just again the SEC? So again here brings my issue we need someone as representation for the retail investor. I don't know how we can do it but we need to figure this out, and the only way to win this is to band together, stay strong and diamond hands .
Below is some links for what i think we can do other then the SEC.
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/sherman-antiturst-act.asp
https://preview.redd.it/bormdl57bgo61.png?width=531&format=png&auto=webp&s=f0f6dbd953bf41f24152c09cbfa741296deb79c1
https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement
https://preview.redd.it/or41spajbgo61.png?width=1007&format=png&auto=webp&s=6d529d3891b1d889b0f3d52245cc27b3164a216a
https://www.consumerfinance.gov/complaint/
https://preview.redd.it/qrddgvjrbgo61.png?width=1213&format=png&auto=webp&s=2ff24772fccf819934d8163f315631e1e4dee214
One of the other post split companies was Standard Oil of Indiana, which later became Amoco and used the old Standard Oil logo almost unaltered.
First of all, I should probably state that I don't really know a damn thing about U.S. law. But I have a question for those who do.
If movie theaters are not allowed to be directly owned by the studios who produce the films, why is Netflix allowed to screen their own productions? This may be a stupid question that can be easily answered but I'd love for someone to explain to me how Netflix as a viewing platform is any different than a movie theater in the eyes of the law and why the same law that prohibits Paramount from owning movie theaters that distribute Paramount productions doesn't apply to Netflix distributing Netflix productions.
Note: IANAL and Blockstream is based in Canada. We need proper Canadian lawyers to look into this. Canada has strong antitrust and anti-racketeering laws as well as the USA.
I started thinking about this topic while I was reading that Greg Maxwell was threatening the BU team with legal action for the use of the word "Blockstream" in one of BUs configuration variables (absurd but true).
"That's interesting," I thought. "We're going to fight in court apparently. I wonder what sort of legal violations Blockstream might be guilty of?"
I'm presenting this layperson analysis to stimulate discussion about two things:
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were actual crimes committed by Blockstream (I think so)
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regardless of criminality, the community needs to expose this harmful behavior for what it is and call out Blockstream once and for all as an attacker
I'd like to review the history and offer my interpretation in the hopes that actual discussion can take place:
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On February 21st, 2016, a group of miners with a significant hashpower majority entered into an agreement brokered by Adam Back, the President of Blockstream, which declared among other things:
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(a) That miners would only run Bitcoin Core-compatible consensus systems
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(b) That Core would continue to follow strategies that limit capacity to no more than 4MB, max
In my opinion, 1a and 1b taken together define a cartel, "an association of suppliers with the purpose of maintaining prices at a high level and restricting competition"
At least in the USA, the landmark Sherman antitrust act in the USA explicitly outlaws such cartels:
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(c) Every contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations, is declared to be illegal
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(d) Every person who shall monopolize, or attempt to monopolize, or combine or conspire with any other person or persons, to monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among the several States, or with foreign nations, shall be deemed guilty of a felony
I believe that a good case can be made that Adam Back, acting as President of Blockstream (1), facilitated and contracted with various miners to create a capacity-limiting, anti-competitive cartel that violates the federal antitrust statutes in the USA, if not Canada.
Now how about racketeering? How is racketeering defined?
In the USA we define it loosely as "a service that is fraudulently offered to solve a problem, such as for a prob
... keep reading on reddit ➡
Greetings from Australia.
So here in Australia, antitrust/cartel legislation has both criminal and civil penalties that sit parallel to each other.
Reading the Sherman Act from the USA, it appears the penalties are only under a criminal regime with no civil regime to speak. Am I mistaken?
I don't study American law so any helpful direction would be appreciated.
Cheers!
This is only half tongue-in-cheek, but I live in the county so we pay for our own trash pickup. There has always been a single player in the market, but recently a new company formed, undercut the big guy, and took many of their customers. This lasted for about 6 months before the big guy bought the little guy. We went back to one choice and prices doubled. A second company appeared, and the same thing happened but more expediently this time.
Now, finding some old garbage trucks and forming my own trash pickup company is on my to-do list, but is it not illegal to just buy out your competitors? There isn't any unwillingness or inability of competitors to enter the market. It's happened twice. The largest company is just using it's market position to stifle competition to the detriment of consumers.
The competition between cable companies is nearly non-existant and its blatantly obvious.
"Approved July 2, 1890, The Sherman Anti-Trust Act was the first Federal act that outlawed monopolistic business practices. The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 was the first measure passed by the U.S. Congress to prohibit trusts." - Wikipedia
Characteristics of a Monopoly: A monopoly market is characterized by the profit maximizer, price maker, high barriers to entry, single seller, and price discrimination. Monopoly characteristics include profit maximizer, price maker, high barriers to entry, single seller, and price discrimination.
Now, from looking at more recent congressional records, it seems like there are fewer abstentions as a percentage of total senators. Why is that?
Sources: http://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes#session=146&chamber=1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherman_Antitrust_Act
It passed the senate 52-1, he was the sole vote against
