A series of anti-monopoly attacks from Europe and the United States! Apple fell more than 4%, the worst in seven months, losing $110 billion in a single day

After the United States, European regulators are also brewing anti-monopoly actions against Apple. Under the threat of a series of regulatory blows, Apple's stock price plummeted.

On Thursday, March 21st, Apple opened lower and continued to decline, with a midday drop of over 4% and a closing drop of about 4.1%. This marked the largest single-day drop since August 4, 2023. After hitting record highs since March 1st for two consecutive days, it erased all gains from the recent three-day rally and fell back to the low point since March 13th, expanding its year-to-date decline to 11%.

Due to the sharp drop in stock price on Thursday, Apple's market value evaporated by over $110 billion in a single day. Although it still ranks second in the U.S. stock market by market value, the gap with the top-ranked Microsoft has widened to over $500 billion.

Earlier on Thursday, the U.S. Department of Justice, together with 16 state attorneys general, filed a lawsuit in a federal court in New Jersey, accusing Apple of violating antitrust laws. They believe that Apple, by using its monopoly position in the smartphone market, harms consumers, developers, and competitor companies, sacrificing these consumers, developers, and competitors to achieve "astronomical valuations." The entire Apple ecosystem from Apple Watch to Apple Pay supports Apple's monopoly.

The lawsuit filed by the Department of Justice and other plaintiffs stated:

"Every step in the Apple product process has established and strengthened its moat of smartphone monopoly."

The document listed Apple's "multiple crimes": Apple uses its power over Apple App distribution to hinder innovations that could make it easier for consumers to switch phones, Apple also refuses to support cross-platform messaging apps, restricts third-party digital wallets and non-Apple branded smartwatches, and disrupts mobile cloud streaming services.

The document stated that Apple's anti-competitive behavior extends beyond Apple and Apple Watch businesses to include Apple's advertising, browsers, FaceTime, and news services. The lawsuit against Apple aims to "liberate the smartphone market from Apple's anti-competitive and exclusionary practices, restore competition, reduce smartphone prices for consumers, lower costs for developers, and preserve innovation for the future of the market."

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said at a press conference on Thursday:

"Apple is not strengthening its monopoly power by making its own products better, but by making other products worse."

"Without restrictions, Apple will only continue to strengthen its monopoly position in the smartphone market."

Media comments noted that during the Trump administration, the U.S. Department of Justice initiated an antitrust investigation against Apple in 2019. A 2020 House investigation concluded that Apple monopolized its software distribution business and made huge profits by charging an "Apple tax." Thursday's lawsuit marks the culmination of a five-year investigation by the U.S. government into Apple Moreover, the media has found that the US government does not rule out the possibility of splitting Apple through this lawsuit. This is because Department of Justice officials indicated in related conference calls that if the government were to win, they would consider the possibility of breaking up the business.

Subsequently, Apple released a statement stating that, both factually and legally, this lawsuit is baseless. Apple innovates day by day, creates technology that people love, designs products that seamlessly collaborate, protects people's privacy and security, and creates a great user experience. Apple believes that this case threatens the foundation of Apple, the principle of allowing its products to stand out in fierce competition, warning that it would "set a dangerous precedent, allowing the government to intervene heavily in the design of technology for the public," and promising to "vigorously defend" itself.

On Thursday, there were reports that the European Union is planning to take action against Apple and Google. According to some media reports, Apple and Google will face a comprehensive investigation by the EU on compliance issues, which could lead to heavy fines. This would be the first action taken by the EU against tech giants since the Digital Markets Act (DMA) came into effect on the 6th of this month.

The media reported that the European Commission is gearing up to announce an investigation into Apple and Google under the DMA in the coming days. The focus of the EU investigation will be on the new fees charged by Apple and Google to app developers, as well as related terms and conditions.

The media also mentioned that Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has proposed to charge users a monthly subscription fee to access data on the Facebook and Instagram platforms. However, the EU may still investigate Meta in the future.

Alphabet, Google's parent company, initially rose by over 1% on Thursday morning but later turned negative, closing down nearly 0.8%, falling from the high reached on Wednesday's rebound since February 9th. Meta rose by nearly 1.9% in early trading on Thursday, but later gave back most of the gains, closing up by over 0.4%