DOJ and 17 state AGs sue food businesses for illegally manipulating egg prices

The Justice Department and 17 U.S. states’ Attorneys General are suing several food companies for illegally coordinating the manipulation of egg prices.

Announced in a Justice Department press release on Tuesday, the complaint — filed in Iowa’s Northern District Court — alleges that the defendants conspired to artificially inflate the daily price quotations of Urner Barry Publications, a market reporting company.

Urner Barry’s publications impact prices that restaurants, grocery stores and other businesses pay for eggs across the country.

The defendants include Mississippi-headquartered Cal-Maine Foods Inc., Arizona-headquartered Hickman’s Egg Ranch Inc., Iowa-headquartered Versova Holdings LLC, Centrum Valley Holdings LLC and Versova Management Cooperative; all produce and sell eggs to grocery stores, restaurants and other businesses that ultimately sell or provide eggs to American consumers.

According to the complaint, the defendants conspired to inflate Urner Barry’s price quotations by agreeing to: submit a lot of bids, submit bids that were unlikely to result in executed trades, cause several defendants to bid to alert Urner Barry that market participants needed to buy eggs and deliver trades at premium prices.

The defendants, along with other egg producers, also bid to obtain eggs on spot markets, including the Egg Clearinghouse, an exchange that helps determine and establish the market value for eggs and egg products.

Urner Barry keeps this bidding information in mind when it issues daily price quotations that influence wholesale egg prices — billions of eggs are sold annually with prices based on Urner Barry’s price quotations.

Egg price quotations dropped significantly from their peak after defendants learned of the Justice Department’s investigation, and were instructed to preserve documents in March 2025, the complaint states.

“No product more quintessentially represents affordability than the price Americans pay for eggs,” Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward said. “These actions prove this Department’s continued commitment to protecting competition and providing real relief for everyday Americans’ pocketbooks.”

The Attorneys General for U.S. states Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Iowa, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Vermont and Wisconsin joined the Justice Department in the complaint and suggested settlements. 

The settlements, if approved by the court, will prevent the defendant companies from coordinating egg price manipulation in the future by restricting them from engaging in anticompetitive communications and agreements with competitors about bids, pricing, transactions, and benchmark reporting.

“These settlements resolve years of conduct that dragged on Americans’ finances and their everyday lives,” former Acting Assistant Attorney General Omeed Assefi of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.

Both the proposed settlements and competitive impact statements will be published in the federal register, as required by the Tunney Act of 1974, which calls for federal courts to review, evaluate and approve proposed settlements in civil antitrust cases brought by the Justice Department.

Interested parties can submit written comments regarding the settlements for up to 60 days after the publication. When this period ends, Iowa’s Northern District Court may enter final judgments upon finding they are in the public interest.

Katherine Pugh is a reporter for Just the News. Follow her on X for more coverage.