The Justice Department
Agri Stats can keep meat price reports, with limits
The proposed settlement would let EMI Price Reports continue, but any U.S. buyer would have to get them on the same terms as meat processors. Agri Stats also could not reveal who supplied the data or help processors use it to push prices higher.
A proposed federal settlement would keep Agri Stats’ EMI Price Reports alive, but without the secrecy and pricing help prosecutors say gave meat processors an edge. The reports would have to be available to outsiders on equal terms.
- EMI Price Reports could keep running under the settlement.
- Outsiders would have to get the reports on equal terms.
- Agri Stats could not reveal who supplied the sales data.
- The company could not use the data to help processors raise prices.
- The Justice Department’s proposed settlement in federal court in Minnesota would let Agri Stats keep its EMI Price Reports, but only if the company stops using them as a private edge for meat processors
The Justice Department’s proposed settlement in federal court in Minnesota would let Agri Stats keep its EMI Price Reports, but only if the company stops using them as a private edge for meat processors. The reports could continue in substantially the same form as of April 24, 2026, yet they would have to be available to any interested party in the United States on terms no worse than those offered to meat processors.
That matters because the underlying case grew out of information exchanges among competing meat processors in broiler chicken, pork and turkey markets. Those are the kinds of markets that feed straight into the prices shoppers see at grocery stores and the bills restaurants pass along at the table.
Opening the books
The deal does not just widen access. It also says Agri Stats cannot disclose the identities of the people who provide Sales Data for EMI Price Reports.
And it cannot provide price opportunities or consulting to help meat processors identify products for raising prices using EMI Sales Data. That is the part prosecutors say turned the service from a reporting business into something closer to a private intelligence channel.
At the shelf and on the menu
The reports can survive. What changes is the secrecy around them and the hands-on pricing help that allegedly gave processors a sharper read on one another’s moves.
The broader lesson is simple: in chicken, pork and turkey, market power can turn on who gets to see pricing information. When that information is controlled by a handful of players, the effects can travel from processor spreadsheets to everyday meat buying.