A Swedish court orders Alphabet’s Google to pay damages to Klarna’s PriceRunner unit after finding that Google unlawfully favored its own price-comparison service in search results. Bloomberg, the Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, Euronews, Quartz, and The Next Web all report that the ruling comes from the Patent and Market Court in Stockholm and relates to Google’s conduct in the market for comparison shopping services.
Across the sources, the court’s damages figure is reported in different currencies and amounts: roughly 14.3 billion Swedish kronor (about €1.3 billion) or around $1.5 billion to nearly $2 billion, depending on the outlet’s conversion. Quartz and Bloomberg describe the award as close to $2 billion, while the Financial Times characterizes it as $1.5 billion.
The common factual basis across outlets is that the court rules Google favored its own comparison shopping tool over PriceRunner for years, constituting anticompetitive behavior. Several outlets also note that PriceRunner sought a higher amount, implying the final award is less than what the claimant requested.
