The State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR), China’s top market regulator, imposed fines on several domestic online giants, including Tencent, units of Alibaba and Bilibili, on the first working day of 2022 for violations of the Anti-Monopoly Law, in a fresh sign of China’s continued efforts to crack down on illegal activities and ensure market order.
Experts believe that this marks the start of a sustained antitrust campaign in 2022, which will see more cases of this sort and more active enforcement of anti-monopoly regulations with the amendment of the Anti-Monopoly Law.
The SAMR imposed nine fines, each amounting to 500,000 yuan (US$78,500), on Tencent, for a total of 4.5 million yuan. Most of the fines involve Tencent’s illegal operations in the acquisition of smaller companies, according to filings published on Tencent’s website.
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