Brussels slaps €890 million fine on Google despite looming new US tariffs
The European Commission announced a €890 million fine against Google on Thursday over alleged self-preferencing practices and unfair treatment of app developers, just as the Trump administration prepares a fresh round of trade duties.
The fine caps an investigation the Commission launched in March 2024 under the Digital Markets Act (DMA), a law setting out a list of dos and don'ts for large tech companies that dominate key digital markets.
The flagship element of the case, leading to a fine worth €460 million, concerns Google's search engine allegedly giving systematic preferential treatment to its own services — Google Shopping, Google Hotels, Google Flights — while downgrading competitors in search results.
Self-preferencing first took centre stage as a legal theory in the landmark Google Shopping antitrust case, confirmed by the EU Court of Justice in 2024, more than a decade after the investigation was formally opened in 2010.
The DMA later codified the concept, with the explicit aim of speeding up enforcement and stripping out many of the evidential hurdles required under traditional antitrust law.
The second strand of the case, amounting to the remaining €430 million, concerns accusations from app developers that Google prevents them from telling consumers how to leave its ecosystem, for instance by promoting cheaper offers available outside its app store or flagging alternative payment systems.
Decision's implications
Beyond the monetary sanction — and arguably more consequential for Google — the Commission has ordered the company to end its non-compliance: treating third-party services without discrimination and letting app developers communicate freely with users.
Google must comply with the Commission's decision within 60 days or face periodic penalty payments of up to 5% of its worldwide turnover.
Google, for its part, argues its services are designed to optimise the user experience, and that changing its search results or app store policies would harm the European digital ecosystem.
"This isn't fair competition; it's product degradation driven by a small group of self-serving complainants, with European businesses and consumers taking the hit. Regulation should improve products, not make them worse," said Google President of Global Affairs Kent Walker.
Google has already begun testing changes to its search service and app store. The Commission says it will continue to monitor their implementation, and considers some of them significant progress towards compliance.
Google did not confirm whether it intends to appeal the decision.
The conclusion of the probe is, on paper, the product of a largely bureaucratic assessment of whether the tech giant breached the bloc's prescriptive rules for fairer, more contestable digital markets. But it risks becoming another point of contention in transatlantic tensions.
US trade tensions
A major fine against an American corporation is set to become another flashpoint with Washington. The Trump administration has repeatedly made clear it views EU digital rules as a trade "irritant," at times equating such fines with commercial tariffs.
A year ago, Brussels and Washington struck a trade deal known as the Turnberry agreement to resolve their trade dispute, under which the EU agreed to remove duties on most US industrial products and accept a 15% US tariff on its own exports.
The Trump administration was forced to adopt new tariffs on a different legal basis after the US Supreme Court ruled the duties it had imposed in 2025 illegal.
That new regime is set to expire this week, and the White House is weighing additional duties expected to target forced labour and overcapacity, following a Section 301 investigation touching on German drug pricing.
EU-US trade tensions have already shaped how Brussels decided to sanction American tech giants in the past. Last September, a fine against Google over its digital advertising business was shelved amid pressure from within the Commission and from the US government.
Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič emerged as the main internal opponent of issuing sensitive sanctions before a deal with Washington was finalised. After that internal rift became public, the Commission went ahead with the fine — but the episode showed how susceptible the EU's investigations were to outside political pressure.
The EU versus Big Tech, and sanctions package approval
In today's newsletter: A potential fine is on its way for a US technology company in breach of the bloc's digital fairness rules, and the EU's 21st package of sanctions finally gets over the line amid criticism from a Baltic head of state in exclusive comments to Euronews.
Hello and good morning. Angela Skujins penning your Thursday dispatch, with some hot news.
We just heard that after marathon talks EU ambassadors early Thursday morning approved the EU's 21st package of sanctions against Russia.
The previous hold out? As my colleague Jorge Liboreiro reports, maritime heavyweight Greece previously clung to its veto due to issues regarding a ban on Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) and its transport. We expect further reporting from Jorge today regarding the play-by-play of how this deal finally got done.
But before we go there, Latvian leader Andris Kulbergs said in exclusive comments on Euronews’ flagship morning news programme Europe Today that European politicians should ask themselves two major questions during the debate. Do they want Ukraine to win, or, "Do they want to earn money?"
"There's a choice. It's not both. So the sanctions has to be implemented," he said. Watch.
Back to Big Tech. As my colleague Luca Bertuzzi reports, the Commission's potential fine for Google rumoured to be handed down today follows a two-year investigation into how the company promotes its own services in search results, and how it stops app developers from directing users to deals outside its app store and payment system.
Why today? German financial newspaper Handelsblatt spoke to two anonymous high-ranking EU officials, who pointed to Thursday on the calendar as it follows a meeting chaired by the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, where the fine would reportedly be rubber-stamped.
Pay the price. Fines for violating the Digital Markets Act (DMA) can reach up to 10% of a company's total worldwide annual turnover. With Google's parent company, Alphabet, reporting a record annual revenue of $402.8 billion (€353.08 billion) in 2025, the maximum penalty imposed by the European Commission could theoretically run into the tens of billions of dollars.
But Google isn’t the only party to potentially suffer. If the DMA fine for the American-based company comes to fruition, the EU risks attracting the ire of US President Donald Trump.
American retaliation? Washington has previously accused Brussels of unfairly targeting American companies through its digital policies. For example, in January, the Republican leader threatened to impose 100% tariffs on any European country that imposed a tax on digital services on US companies.
Right now, Brussels is walking a tightrope of tense transatlantic relations. Outside of the battle over big tech, the US government is preparing fresh import duties on the bloc as the current ones are due to expire this week.
The EU executive is expected to bow to these fresh import levies after the current regime lapses, according to Peggy Corlin, but many are concerned there could be additional retaliation following the DMA dispute.
“Toxic” Putin. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated in his nightly address that his country’s frontline gains and mid-range strikes are creating a “toxic” atmosphere around Russian President Vladimir Putin. But does this stench waft from Moscow to Manila?
Russian state-run news agency TASS confirms that Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is meeting with his American counterpart Marco Rubio on the sidelines of the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) Foreign Ministers meeting in the Philippine capital. The meeting is scheduled to take place during the morning of 23 July.
In Manila, Rubio said the US remains open to playing a role in ending the conflict, “if that opportunity presents itself”. He did admit, however, the efforts have “fallen off a little bit over the last few months”.
Washington's attention has increasingly shifted to the Middle East following the conflict with Iran, particularly with news coming in overnight that the US announced a landmark nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia.
The framework allows the country in the future to produce enriched uranium, a key ingredient for nuclear fuel as well as nuclear bombs.
Fighting for peace. Kallas used her time speaking at the ASEAN forum in Manila to reiterate to partners, as well as observers, to “join the calls” that Russia should stop its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Her team confirmed to Euronews yesterday that she had no scheduled meeting with Lavrov herself.
Some extra news: a major blow to proponents of migration crackdown**.** The European Commission on Thursday refused to register a controversial European Citizens’ Initiative spearheaded by far-right activists due to “discrimination grounded on race and ethnic origin”.
The document calls on the Commission to temporarily stop all “non-Western immigration channels” including study and family reunification visas. On top of this, irregular and regular migrants who have not integrated into European society should swiftly be returned to their country of origin, the document states.
EU set to bow to fresh US tariffs after current regime lapses
The European Union is preparing to accept new tariffs the United States is expected to impose in the coming days over forced labour, as long as they do not exceed the 15 percent cap agreed under the Turnberry agreement, the European Commission said.
As Peggy Corlin reports, the White House said in early June that it would impose fresh duties on its global trading partners, arguing that insufficient efforts to curb trade in goods produced using forced labour were harming US commercial interests.
The current US tariff regime expires on Friday, and US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said on Tuesday that implementation of the forced labour duties was imminent.
European officials are closely monitoring the level of the new tariffs, as an EU-US trade agreement signed in July 2025 in Turnberry, Scotland, by US President Donald Trump and Commission President Ursula von der Leyen caps US duties on EU goods at 15 percent.
Read more of Peggy’s analysis to understand what's at stake.
More from our newsrooms
Could Gianni Infantino really become UN Secretary General if Trump puts him forward?
US President Donald Trump can recommend the boss of FIFA, Gianni Infantino, to lead the United Nations, but not impose him over the other candidates — and the other permanent members of the Security Council would need to endorse him. Vincenzo Genovese explains.
Hungary's prosecutor resigns under pressure in political win for Magyar
Hungary's Prosecutor General, Gábor Bálint Nagy, has resigned amid mounting political pressure as Prime Minister Péter Magyar seeks to replace Orbán-era officials. The move follows allegations of political bias by lawyers for detained Ukrainian cash couriers in a cross-border cash seizure case. Sandor Zsiros and Rita Konya have the latest.
Energy and fertiliser crisis due to war will continue to drive up food inflation, UN says
Rising energy and fertiliser prices are likely to continue contributing to food inflation globally, the UN warned in its latest report. This in turn can drive up the cost of a healthy diet and threaten progress against global hunger. Read more about this story by Indrabati Lahiri.
We're also keeping an eye on
- EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas continues her trip to Manila for the ASEAN summit, and will meet with Gilbert Teodoro, Secretary of National Defence of Philippines, as well as other leaders.
- The European Central Bank (ECB) holds its Governing Council meeting in Frankfurt, with President Christine Lagarde delivering a press conference at 2:45 pm.
- European Commissioner for Defence Andrius Kubilius to deliver a speech at the EU Defence Night in Washington, US.
That’s it for today. Luca Bertuzzi, Vincenzo Genovese and Jorge Liboreiro contributed to this newsletter.
No comments:
Post a Comment