Google Runs Out of Appeals, Must Pay Record $4.7 Billion EU Antitrust Fine

Arjun Kharpal, reporting for CNBC, back on July 2:

Europe’s top court on Thursday upheld Google’s fine of around 4.1 billion euros ($4.67 billion) over alleged anti-competitive practices.

In 2018, the European Commission slapped Google with the record-breaking penalty on the grounds that it abused Android’s mobile dominance to give unfair advantage to its own apps via pre-installation deals with smartphone makers.

Google has been appealing the ruling through the EU court system. But the European Court of Justice (ECJ), Europe’s top court, dismissed Google’s appeal. Google has no further right to appeal.

Google last year booked $132 billion in profit; this fine is about 3 percent of that. But in 2018, when the fine was initially assessed, Google booked “just” $31 billion in profit — this fine, if they’d paid it then, would have been about 15 percent of their annual profit. (And they booked only $13B, $19B, $16B, and $14B in profit going back from 2017 to 2014.)

There’s never a reason not to string the appeal process out, but it’s especially true when your profits are growing at an exceptional rate. By growing their profits around 5×, they’ve reduced the relative pain of this fine by 5×.

★ Friday, 17 July 2026