And that is, indeed, what Facebook has become: not just a monopoly, but a natural monopoly. The company is, without doubt, a monopoly; it possesses dominant share in several subsectors of the consumer internet industry, be they social media, web-based text messaging or photo-sharing.

Antitrust Laws – Examples

• The Sherman Act. The Sherman Act was created to outlaw any contract or conspiracy to resist trade and any monopolization or conspiracy to monopolize.
• The Federal Trade Commission Act.
• The Clayton Act.

Europe’s top antitrust watchdog, the European Commission, accused Amazon on Tuesday of violating competition law by using nonpublic data it gathers from third-party merchants to unfairly compete against the smaller sellers.

Natural Monopoly Examples

• Railroads. This is a very well-known example, often used as the quintessential model of a natural monopoly.
• Regional Bus Services. Like railroads, having multiple bus companies in a particular area does not make sense.
• Utilities.
• Plane Manufacturing.

Facebook generated revenues of more than $70bn and profits above $18.5bn in just the last year, according to the FTC’s complaint, and regulators allege that anticompetitive actions taken by the company’s executives, including Mark Zuckberg, gave them a monopoly in the market.

The Walt Disney Company is among the largest companies in the world by market capitalization, and is not only a strong and well-recognized brand, but also a profitable one.

oligopoly

Pure or perfect competition is a theoretical market structure in which the following criteria are met: All firms sell an identical product (the product is a “commodity” or “homogeneous”). All firms are price takers (they cannot influence the market price of their product). Market share has no influence on prices.