Smithfield Foods has agreed to pay $75 million to settle a lawsuit by consumers who accused the meat producer and several competitors of conspiring to inflate prices in the $20 billion-a-year U.S. pork market by limiting supply, reports Reuters.
A preliminary settlement in the antitrust case was filed on Tuesday night with the federal court in Minneapolis, and requires approval by U.S. District Judge John Tunheim.
The accord follows the judge's September 14 approval of a similar $20 million settlement between consumers and JBS SA.
Several companies have faced lawsuits in Minneapolis and Chicago also accusing them of inflating beef and chicken prices.
In the pork litigation, Smithfield previously reached settlements of $83 million with so-called "direct" purchasers such as Maplevale Farms and $42 million with commercial purchasers, a group that includes restaurants.
The case is In re Pork Antitrust Litigation, U.S. District Court, District of Minnesota, No. 18-01776.
Smithfield Foods is headquartered in Smithfield, VA. In addition to owning over 500 farms in the U.S., Smithfield contracts with another 2,000 independent farms around the country to raise Smithfield's pigs. Outside the U.S., the company has facilities in Mexico, Poland, Romania, Germany, Slovakia and the United Kingdom. In 2013, WH Group (formerly known as Shuanghui International Holdings) purchased Smithfield for $4.7 billion.
