Cement and Concrete
Practice Area: Antitrust
Asterisk Luxury Homes, Inc. v. Cemex Corp., et al., 1:09-cv-23461-JAL
On November 12, 2009, Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll PLLC filed a class action complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida on behalf of Plaintiff Asterisk Luxury Homes, Inc. and a class of all similarly situated purchasers of Cement and Concrete in Florida.
The suit alleges that Cemex Corp, Florida Rock Industries, Inc., Holcim Inc., Lehigh Cement Company, Oldcastle Materials, Titan America LLC, Suwannee American Cement LLC, and Votorantim Cimentos North America conspired to charge supra-competitive prices for Cement and Concrete. Defendants dominate the market for Cement and own many of the Concrete manufacturers in Florida. Cement is the primary ingredient in Concrete. By fixing the price of Cement, Defendants ensured that the price for Concrete would remain artificially high because independent Concrete manufacturers would be unable to obtain cement at competitive prices.
Asterisk Luxury Homes charges that Defendants maintained their conspiracy by meeting secretly and agreeing to increase the price Cement and Concrete. The fact of Defendants’ coordinated behavior is readily apparent: for example, in 2008, at a time when the collapse of the housing market and resulting recession had dramatically reduced demand for concrete, Defendants announced a uniform 30% increase in the price of Concrete.
The alleged anticompetitive conduct does not stop with price fixing. Plaintiff contends that Defendants divided up the market for Cement in Florida, ensuring that Defendants faced no competition in their respective regions. According to the complaint, Defendants threaten to fire employees who tried to sell Cement to a competitor’s client. And, Plaintiff asserts, in 2004 Defendants conspired to restrict the supply of Cement in order to drive up prices.
As a result of the Defendants’ conspiracy, the prices for Cement and Concrete have consistently risen since 2000—even after the housing bubble burst in 2005 and commercial construction slowed. Defendants have been fined millions by antitrust authorities in Colombia, Brazil, Taiwan, Argentina, Germany, and the European Commission based on similar conduct. American builders and purchasers hurt by their conduct have yet to recover.