Itaú Unibanco and its card-processing company Redecard have agreed to pay R$21 million (US$4.3 million) in a settlement with Brazil’s competition authority, and to cease their discriminatory practices in the payments card processing market.
The investigation was initiated in March 2016 and also investigates Bradesco and Banco do Brasil and its subsidiary Cielo. The suspicion is that the institutions are signing exclusive contracts with commercial establishments and adopting practices such as married sale, retaliation and discrimination in the collection of tariffs. By doing so, they would prevent the shopkeeper from gaining access to other creditor companies, thereby harming competition.
The proposed agreement was presented to CADE by Itaú in June this year and approved at the meeting of the body of this Wednesday.
Full Content: UOL Economia
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