[lots2learn]

I used to be an FBA seller and made an exit via sale to private equity (i.e. an aggregator). The FTC will likely fail on all or most fronts imo. Amazon's price fixing helps consumers because they simply don't show you the product if it's not the best price on the web. FBA fees are not "profits" taken by Amazon because logistics is not a profit-center for their business. Copying successful third party sellers' products, as annoying as it is (it happened to me more than once), doesn't appear to break any laws. Advertising costs keep rising yes, but again, how is that illegal? At some point, there may be an opportunity for some young entrepreneurial minded person to create their own marketplace open to third party sellers and undercut Amazon's commission (currently 15pct in most categories) and have cheaper advertising costs due to lower competition. The reason why currently this is likely not viable is that FBA is still faster and cheaper than any other existing fulfillment service last I checked. The margin difference between lower commission+cheaper advertising vs more expensive (and slower) fulfillment is still - I believe - in Amazon's favor. FBA, by the way, is open to use even if you sell on your own website. The service is called Amazon MCF (multi channel fulfillment), but the cost and speed is not as good as real FBA. I often wondered what Amazon gains by offering MCF and can't help but think it has something to do with making the appearance of not being anti-competitive.