Big Four CEOs Testified In Anti Trust Hearing

[RAMROD 117,011]

 

The leaders of Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google took a brutal political lashing Wednesday as Democrats and Republicans confronted the executives for wielding their market power to crush competitors and amass data, customers and sky-high profits.

Fending off accusations of stifling competition, four Big Tech CEOs — Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Sundar Pichai of Google and Tim Cook of Apple — are answering for their companies’ practices before Congress as a House panel caps its yearlong investigation of market dominance in the industry.

The powerful CEOs sought to defend their companies amid intense grilling by lawmakers on Wednesday.

The rare interrogation played out over the course of a nearly six-hour hearing, with lawmakers on the House’s top antitrust subcommittee coming armed with millions of documents, hundreds of hours of interviews and in some cases the once-private messages of Silicon Valley’s elite chiefs. They said it showed some in the tech sector had become too big and powerful, threatening rivals, consumers and, in some cases, even democracy itself.

The executives provided bursts of data showing how competitive their markets are, and the value of their innovation and essential services to consumers. But they sometimes struggled to answer pointed questions about their business practices. They also confronted a range of other concerns about alleged political bias, their effect on U.S. democracy and their role in China.

The four CEOs were testifying remotely to lawmakers, most of whom were sitting, in masks, inside the hearing room in Washington.

Among the toughest questions for Google and Amazon involved accusations that they used their dominant platforms to scoop up data about competitors in a way that gave them an unfair advantage.

Bezos said in his first testimony to Congress that he couldn’t guarantee that the company had not accessed seller data to make competing products, an allegation that the company and its executives have previously denied.

Regulators in the U.S. and Europe have scrutinized Amazon’s relationship with the businesses that sell on its site and whether the online shopping giant has been using data from the sellers to create its own private-label products.

 

 

 

Source:

https://apnews.com/25a4d18ae3989402f0ad23f38d8cfa23?utm_medium=AP&utm_source=Twitter&utm_campaign=SocialFlow

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/

[blankpaper 21]

Haha as an accountant, “Big 4” means something else and I was so confused why I hadn’t heard about a hearing 

[datlastfam 5,815]

46 minutes ago, blankpaper said:

Haha as an accountant, “Big 4” means something else and I was so confused why I hadn’t heard about a hearing 

same here, I clicked and was thinking of any "hearing" sh*t which I have never heard before related with pwc or something

[blankpaper 21]

18 minutes ago, datlastfam said:

same here, I clicked and was thinking of any "hearing" sh*t which I have never heard before related with pwc or something

Well, EY has the Wirecard audit issues, and KPMG had a scandal with the PCAOB a couple years ago. Not antitrust though 

[Gagaloo911 12,959]

They need to all be broken up. It should never have been allowed to let them get as big as they have to begin with.

Break em up now!

[RAMROD 117,011]

1 hour ago, blankpaper said:

Haha as an accountant, “Big 4” means something else and I was so confused why I hadn’t heard about a hearing 

 

32 minutes ago, datlastfam said:

same here, I clicked and was thinking of any "hearing" sh*t which I have never heard before related with pwc or something

 

I mean, the thread clearly tagged as "tech" in case y'all missing that 

[GaGaAst 13,124]

1 hour ago, blankpaper said:

Haha as an accountant, “Big 4” means something else and I was so confused why I hadn’t heard about a hearing 

ya same 😂.

I was guessing it's probably India considering this was demanded a year back on all big 4 firms due to lack of quality control on assurance engagement 

 

[blankpaper 21]

4 minutes ago, GaGaAst said:

ya same 😂.

I was guessing it's probably India considering this was demanded a year back on all big 4 firms due to lack of quality control on assurance engagement 

 

Why is it always the audit/assurance side that has the issues 😂 I think a KPMG partner ended up in prison last year after the PCAOB insider thing 

[blankpaper 21]

9 minutes ago, RAMROD said:

 

 

I mean, the thread clearly tagged as "tech" in case y'all missing that 

I mean...there’s some overlap between accounting and tech. Especially with the whole Wirecard audit issue with EY

[GaGaAst 13,124]

2 hours ago, blankpaper said:

Why is it always the audit/assurance side that has the issues 😂 I think a KPMG partner ended up in prison last year after the PCAOB insider thing 

I don't know about US but here in India, once the company starts showing issues , all eyes are on statutory auditors, especially for listed entities. Its only a matter of time that fraud is revealed. Strangely IA/Risk advisory team is given pass when they are the one who should be scrutinized. 

Ya poor KPMG dude.

CEO of Deloitte India was fined 20000 USD and barred from practice for 7 years just a week back here. 

[Bt1 5,213]

It is really a complicated issue that I dont think politicians even bother understanding. 

US politicians dont like that these companies have so much power at home, but they wouldn't want a Chinese or European  company to replace facebook and amazon overseas. 

The fact they put all 4 in the same boat shows how superficial they are.