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Technology Stocks : Advanced Micro Devices - Moderated (AMD) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: wbmw who wrote (241920)	10/5/2007 3:13:22 PM
From: fastpathguru	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 275872

FPG, honest question here: I like the way you summed that up, and I don't know if Intel is guilty of using that pricing method today, but if they are, then it certainly meets your conclusions at the bottom. Heartfelt thanks. Bookmark it so we don't have to go over it again... :) That makes it a very self-serving pricing situation, but my question is whether it's illegal under the law today. If it's illegal, and Intel does it, and Intel knows about it (presumably), then they would have to be fined for willfully violating the law. Is a "90% of customer's needs" triggered rebate against the law? Pretty clearly, yes IMHO. The act itself is specifically prohibited: law.cornell.edu And it more generally constitutes both a restraint of trade (google: "define: restraint of trade") and raises prices to consumers: en.wikipedia.org And it would be hard to justify the economics of the rebate on that last 10% as resulting from volume efficiencies, which is the only escape clause re: rebates. If it's not illegal, and it should be, then perhaps the result of the anti-trust investigation is to make it illegal, thereby forcing Intel to stop. If they don't, then you can certainly conclude that Intel's pricing is not beneficial to the vendor or the consumer, but there's nothing to stop them from finding a pricing structure that maximizes their profits. See above. Lastly, if Intel is not participating in this kind of pricing scheme, then this whole debate is moot. This debate, sure. :) I'd like to understand a few more specifics, then, about this theory of yours (again, nice post). It's not my theory, it's spelled out somewhat more succinctly in AMD's complaint, with corroborating allegations as well (It explains the notion of why HP would refuse literally free AMD processors, for one.) fpg