Washington, D.C. — May 22, 2025 — The U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission filed a joint statement of interest today in a federal antitrust case targeting BlackRock, State Street, and Vanguard over alleged efforts to reduce coal production through the coordinated use of their ownership stakes in competing energy companies.
Filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, the case — Texas et al. v. BlackRock, Inc. — was brought by a coalition of states led by the Texas Attorney General. The lawsuit claims that the asset management giants used their influence as major shareholders to discourage coal output, allegedly resulting in higher energy costs for American consumers.
The statement marks the first time the federal antitrust agencies have weighed in before a court on the implications of common ownership — a hotly debated issue in competition law where investors hold stakes in multiple competing companies.
“With the President having declared a national energy emergency, we need competition in coal production now more than ever to help fuel American energy dominance,” said Abigail A. Slater, Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division. “American consumers suffer when institutional asset managers use shareholdings in competing companies to orchestrate output reductions.”
Slater emphasized that social or environmental justifications, such as those tied to ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) goals, “do not make [anticompetitive conduct] any less unlawful,” citing longstanding Supreme Court precedent.
The statement underscores that while most index fund investments and shareholder advocacy remain protected under existing antitrust “safe harbor” provisions for passive investors, those protections do not extend to behavior that allegedly encourages market-wide cutbacks in production across competitors. The agencies argue that this type of conduct can violate antitrust laws even if it is framed as environmentally or socially responsible.
The legal filing comes in the wake of recent executive orders from President Trump declaring a national energy emergency (Executive Order 14156) and directing federal agencies to support increased domestic energy production, including coal (Executive Order 14261).
The Justice Department and FTC routinely file statements of interest in federal antitrust cases to clarify legal standards and protect competitive markets. Today’s filing seeks to ensure that powerful financial institutions are not shielded from liability when using concentrated ownership to influence entire industries.
The full collection of antitrust statements and filings can be found on the Antitrust Division’s website.
