## Facts

- A certified class of direct purchasers of potash in the United States sued major North American potash producers for allegedly fixing prices from April 1987 to July 1994.
- Potash is a mineral used in fertilizer; most potash consumed in the United States is sourced from Saskatchewan, Canada.
- The parties agreed the market was an oligopoly with few sellers and a homogeneous product, where price uniformity can occur without coordination.
- In the 1980s, the industry faced overproduction and depressed prices.
- In 1986, following privatization of one producer and trade-related complaints, U.S. Commerce proceedings led to a 1988 “suspension agreement” establishing a minimum export price for Canadian potash sold into the United States.
- After the suspension agreement, one producer raised prices and others followed; prices later declined but remained higher than pre-agreement levels.
- Plaintiffs relied on parallel pricing, inter-firm communications, and trade-association interactions as circumstantial evidence of an unlawful agreement.

## Issues

1. Whether evidence of parallel price movements in an oligopolistic market, combined with communications and trade-association activity, supported a reasonable inference of a concerted price-fixing agreement under Sherman Act § 1.
2. Whether a government-approved minimum-price export regime could, in context, explain observed pricing behavior as lawful independent action rather than collusion.
3. Whether plaintiffs presented sufficient “plus factors” tending to exclude independent action to survive summary judgment.

## Decision

- The en banc Eighth Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the producers.
- The court held plaintiffs’ evidence did not permit a reasonable inference of an agreement to fix prices.
- The court treated the pricing behavior as consistent with lawful oligopolistic interdependence, particularly given the minimum-price structure created by the suspension agreement.
- The court found the alleged “plus factors” (communications, association activity, and market structure) did not tend to exclude independent, rational pricing decisions.
- Because the evidence was as consistent with lawful conduct as with illegal conspiracy, the case could not proceed to trial.

## Legal Principles

- Sherman Act § 1 liability requires proof of an agreement; parallel conduct alone, especially in an oligopoly, is insufficient.
- Conscious parallelism and price leadership may reflect rational, independent decisionmaking in concentrated markets rather than unlawful concerted action.
- To infer an agreement from circumstantial evidence, plaintiffs must present “plus factors” that reasonably tend to exclude independent action.
- At summary judgment in antitrust conspiracy cases, evidence that is equally consistent with lawful behavior and unlawful agreement does not create a triable issue.

## Conclusion

The court held that oligopoly-style parallel pricing, even when accompanied by industry contacts and occurring under a government-influenced minimum-price framework, did not supply the additional evidentiary “plus factors” needed to infer a Sherman Act § 1 price-fixing agreement, so summary judgment for defendants was proper.


Blomkest Fertilizer, Inc. v. Potash Corp. of Sask., Inc., 203 F.3d 1028 (8th Cir. 2000) (en banc)