U.S. and states settle egg price manipulation case, companies pay millions

The Justice Department and 17 states settled an egg price-manipulation case on June 29 with Cal-Maine Foods, Versova/Centrum and Hickman’s Egg Ranch, securing $3.3 million in payments and a pledge to donate 53 million eggs to food banks and nonprofit groups across participating states. For shoppers, the case lands directly on grocery bills: eggs are a staple, and regulators said the alleged scheme pushed prices higher for retailers and consumers.

New York Attorney General Letitia James said the states and the Justice Department uncovered an illegal scheme to manipulate egg prices, and her office said the companies coordinated for years to influence a daily price index used in egg contracts. Cal-Maine said separately that it would pay $1.5 million and donate 30 million eggs, while denying wrongdoing and saying it was not assessed any fines or penalties. Cal-Maine has described itself as the largest egg company in the United States, underscoring why the case drew close attention from consumer advocates and antitrust enforcers.

Hawaii Attorney General Anne Lopez’s office said the conduct under investigation ran from about June 2022 to March 2025 and involved secret communications intended to coordinate bidding activity and influence egg price quotes published by Urner Barry, a benchmark pricing service widely used in egg supply contracts. In December 2022, Hickman’s CEO emailed Versova and Cal-Maine executives urging them to submit “strong bids, early and often,” a message investigators treated as part of the price-coordination effort.

The agreement requires the companies to end any illegal coordination, adopt compliance measures, designate antitrust compliance officers and report violations to the states and the Justice Department. That makes the settlement more than a cash payment: it adds an oversight structure meant to make future collusion harder to conceal in a market where a few large producers can shape pricing signals that ripple through supermarkets.

James had already warned businesses against price gouging eggs and poultry amid the bird flu outbreak in January 2025, and she pointed to a 2021 settlement with Hillandale Farms that delivered 1.2 million eggs to New Yorkers. The new case is larger by a wide margin in both eggs and money, but the $3.3 million payout remains modest compared with the potential impact on households that paid higher prices during the alleged coordination.