A silver dealer has been warned by the Commerce Commission and banned from online auction site Trade Me over an attempt to fix prices.
In June and July 2011, the commmission alleges Silver Seller Limited attempted to form an agreement with a competitor to fix prices for gold and silver bullion sold online.
The competitor did not respond to emails from a Silver Seller director and instead alerted the commission and Trade Me, which banned the company from trading on the website.
Price fixing or attempting to do so is illegal under Section 30 of the Commerce Act and breaches can result in fines of up to $10 million.
However, Commerce Commission competition manager Richard Hutton says it has a policy of being lenient to first-time offenders.
He says a warning was appropriate in this case, since price fixing did not go ahead and consumers were not affected.
