Concrete and cement additives price-fixing lawsuit dismissed by US judge

By Jonathan Stempel

NEW YORK (Reuters) -A U.S. judge in Manhattan on Wednesday dismissed a nationwide antitrust lawsuit accusing six companies that sell the vast majority of concrete and cement additives in the United States and Europe of conspiring to drive up prices.

U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman said the "extreme and persistent" price hikes alleged by purchasers were "episodic," and inconsistent with coordinated activity in the estimated $27 billion global market for additives and so-called admixtures.

"Plaintiffs' allegations fall short of suggesting that the price increases were not the product of normal market forces or that the explanations given were pretextual so as to suggest an antitrust conspiracy," Liman wrote.

The defendants include Germany's BASF, Britain's Cinven Group, Italy's Mapei, Ohio-based RPM, France's Saint-Gobain and Switzerland's Sika.

According to court papers, they control an estimated 80% to 90% of the $3 billion U.S. market for the additives, which are chemicals added to concrete, cement and mortar to improve the finished products' strength and stability.

In his 50-page decision, Liman also said "plus factors" such as mergers, memberships in trade associations, and scrutiny by U.S. and European competition regulators suggested at most that a price-fixing conspiracy was possible, not plausible.

Lawyers for the purchasers did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Liman said the purchasers can try to replead most claims. The alleged conspiracy began in 2017.

Litigation began after the European Commission in October 2023 conducted surprise inspections, which the purchasers called "dawn raids," at several producers of construction chemicals, on suspicion of possible anticompetitive conduct.

The commission said the inspections were a preliminary investigatory step and did not mean it found anticompetitive behavior.

In May 2024, the U.S. Department of Justice confirmed a Pennsylvania grand jury had begun probing the concrete and cement additives industry.

The case is In re Concrete and Cement Additives Antitrust Litigation, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, No. 24-md-03097.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by Aurora Ellis)