Into one basket: FAS will deal with marketplaces

The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) will develop draft laws regulating the activities of marketplaces. Izvestia investigated which way regulation would be directed and how much it corresponded to the interests of business.

The problem of monopolies

The level of monopolization of the online trading market in Russia is extremely high, according to the FAS. According to the head of the department, Maxim Shaskolsky, the rules regarding sellers on the largest marketplaces need to be changed.

Responding to questions from Izvestia, the FAS also recalled that in February, the service issued warnings to two of Russia's largest marketplaces about the need to provide a voluntary, transparent and predictable mechanism for sellers to participate in promotions. After that, the platforms implemented the FAS warnings in June 2025. In August, the FAS received numerous complaints from SME representatives. And in early October, members of the FAS Expert Council for the Development of Competition in the field of information technology considered that the actions of marketplaces contain risks.

The government has instructed the FAS to prepare a number of draft laws on antimonopoly regulation of marketplaces by the end of 2027. In particular, it is necessary to create a platform where it is possible to track the supply and demand for high-tech products in real time.

The Federation Council, in turn, is interested in providing discounts to customers who pay for purchases with bank cards controlled by online platforms. According to the senators, there should be no such advantages for affiliated structures, and the price should be uniform for all buyers, no matter which payment method they prefer.

The Bank of Russia has joined the problem of equalizing the competitiveness of market participants, as the status of banks — subsidiaries of marketplaces — is approaching systemically significant ones.

Voluntarily-forcibly

The FAS records violations of the principles of transparency and balance of interests at the largest marketplaces. Among the problematic practices are tools in which the site actually sets the price for the seller, restricts the ability to refuse additional services, and also uses the balance index, which affects the cost of storage and forced discounts, Lyubov Filin, head of the Laboratory of Evidence—based regulation at the Gaidar Institute, points out the pressing problems of sellers.

"These mechanisms create risks of infringing on the interests of entrepreneurs and distorting competition," she complains.

At the same time, as the expert admits, marketplaces respond to warnings from the Federal Antimonopoly Service and cancel unfair practices.

The logical rationale

The changes in legislation are designed to eliminate price discrimination and economic contradictions, says Linda Ryzhykh, associate professor of Management at the Presidential Academy in St. Petersburg.

— Thus, different tariffs for different categories of goods or regions may be regarded as unjustified discrimination. User segmentation creates risks of violating antitrust laws in the absence of a clear economic justification," she says.

Ryzhykh stressed that the FAS uses a costly method of regulation, which contradicts the market business models of platforms, according to which the price is formed on the basis of consumer value — the dynamics of the equilibrium of market demand and supply are difficult to formalize within the framework of antimonopoly control.

— As for commissions and fees, there are also certain problems here. The difference in commissions by product category requires careful economic justification, and the lack of transparency in their formation creates risks of violations. If there is a significant gap between costs and commissions, monopolistically high prices can be set," says Linda Ryzhykh.

Mass blockages

The FAS also acts in the interests of copyright holders. In the first six months of 2025 alone, 3.1 million product cards were blocked as a result of complaints that violated other people's intellectual, copyright and trademark rights, including cases of outright counterfeiting.

However, according to Ekaterina Kosareva, managing partner of the analytical agency VMT Consult, this is a drop in the bucket.

— A vivid example of the year 2025 is labubu toys in all variants, from pens and notebooks that exploit a recognizable image to outright fakes disguised as original products, priced from 400 rubles. While the prices of original products start from several thousand rubles. There are thousands of false brands with similar products. In fact, blocking is pointless — it is not difficult to make a new product card, the only problem is to catch up with traffic, systemic regulation and the help of marketplaces themselves are needed — which will slow down this process in every possible way, since such sales generate large revenue, and copyright holders continue to lose money and, possibly, reputation, she argues.

Get to the point

Selling your own products through marketplaces is a common practice in developed markets, notes Lyubov Filin. "It is not considered a violation if the principle of equal access conditions for all sellers, transparency of promotion algorithms and the presence of different marks of the marketplace seller from other sellers are respected," she says.

The expert cites the example of Amazon's global marketplace, which has been combining the functions of an intermediary and a seller for many years and sells products under its own brands.

"But, as the FAS notes, it is critically important that marketplaces do not use internal data from third—party sellers to promote their products and do not distort search results, otherwise there is a risk of abuse of a dominant position," the expert added.

Magomed Magomedov, an analyst at Finam, called the idea of a ban on combining the roles of a seller and a marketplace radical. According to the expert, the share of direct sales from marketplaces is decreasing in favor of a more marginal commission model, but a complete ban on direct sales will dramatically worsen financial performance.

Linda Ryzhykh, on the contrary, considers the priority promotion of her own products by platforms to be a factor that creates unequal competitive conditions, which means that the problem requires a legislative solution.

A blow to fintech

Magomedov assessed the negative consequences of the ban on pricing depending on the payment method for the industry. Now fintech areas (own cards, payment services) play an important role for marketplaces, he noted.

As the analyst noted, discounts for payments with a marketplace card are an effective tool for attracting and retaining customers.

—Banning such promotions will reduce the attractiveness of these products and deprive the site of a cheap and working channel for audience growth of fintech services," Magomedov summarizes.

Online vs. Offline

In addition to the obvious power of marketplaces, which set unfavorable conditions for cooperation with sellers, the very possibility of ousting other trading formats from the market, primarily offline, "land-based", is dangerous, says Deputy Director of the Institute for National and Comparative Law Research at the National Research University HSE, a leading expert at the Institute of Economics and Regulation of Infrastructure Industries at the National Research University HSE, a member of the Public Council at the Federal Antimonopoly Service Oleg Moskvitin of Russia.

— Marketplaces, however, demonstrate flexibility by complying with all the requirements and warnings of the antimonopoly regulator. Currently, a different format of soft impact is being used — a discussion of marketplace practices at the FAS expert council with the participation of associations of their counterparties and the designation of the regulator's position on the need to adjust such practices, says the expert.

In his opinion, this should reduce the risks to the market faster than lengthy investigations and fines.

— In addition, we note that the difficulties of the past years related to novelty and digital specifics have been overcome. The FAS has developed approaches, and changes have also been made to the legislation," Moskvitin added.

Not only marketplaces

The FAS will develop antimonopoly regulation not only for marketplaces. The changes will affect any sites where it will be possible to learn something about the product and buy it, says Ekaterina Kosareva.

— We are talking about specialized groups in social networks, classifieds and online fairs. They are not directly transactional platforms," the analyst clarifies.