Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg
Here's what getting into antitrust trouble looks like:
http://www.law360.com/articles/85401...rust-jail-time
Getting in trouble would thus mean senior executives going to jail for criminal antitrust. Not only didn't the Department of Justice pursue that, I can't see them doing anything likely to push down the stock price. Apple may not be too big to fail, but I do believe it is too big to really punish.
The Apple executive who made the most incriminating statements, in terms of antitrust, was Steve Jobs. And he died before it would have been possible to indict him. But if Jobs lived, do any of us think he would now be in prison? I think not, because it would be so politically unpopular. |
Jailing Apple executives for anti-trust violations wouldn't be an unpopular move. When you get right down to it, no one really cares about the Apple executives.
Jailing executives serves as a warning to other executives to not commit anti-trust violations. I ending up in jail is a viable result of an executive's proposed business strategy, that strategy will be adjusted until that risk goes away.
And don't think that Apple executives are safe from this. They are currently in the anti-trust doghouse, and if they are found guilty of a different one (or even not cooperating with the original sentence), the judge may decide to really drive home society's displeasure with such behaviour.