Just like the D.C. weather, the FTC's docket was hot this past week. The agency (1) shared updates on settlements requiring refunds to consumers in a number of recent actions; (2) announced the reopening of its "Epic" settlement claim process; and (3) announced several new settlements the agency has reached in both the competition and consumer protection spaces; in some of these, the Commissioners issued statements, allowing readers a glimpse into the minds of the enforcers and decision makers themselves. These stories and more after the jump.
Monday, June 23, 2025
Bureau of Consumer Protection: Investment / Advertising and Marketing
- The FTC reached a settlement agreement with Ascent Ecom, a business opportunity company. The agency alleged that Ascent Ecom failed to fulfill its income promises to consumers and attempted to prevent consumers from filing complaints and reviews against it. The settlement agreement's provisions include a permanent ban on Ascent Ecom selling or marketing any business opportunity or business coaching products and services, a prohibition on making misleading or unsubstantiated earnings claims, and a requirement that Ascent Ecom turn over assets to fund customer refunds. The proposed order includes a monetary judgment of $25 million to further fulfill the refunds.
Tuesday, June 24, 2025
Bureau of Consumer Protection: Health / Deceptive, Misleading Conduct / Advertising and Marketing
- The FTC filed a complaint against Mercury Marketing, LLC, an online advertisement company that targets individuals seeking substance use disorder treatment, and other defendants. The agency alleges that defendants deceived consumers by displaying a certain substance use disorder treatment clinic on Google search ads but then directing phone calls to defendant's call center instead. According to the complaint, when speaking with defendant call center representatives—who were claiming to be from the advertised treatment clinic—consumers were deterred from seeking care at the advertised clinics. Call center representatives would tell customers that clinical professionals were instead recommending treatment at defendant clinics based on the consumer's individual history and needs. The complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland.
Bureau of Consumer Protection: Deceptive, Misleading Conduct / Jobs / Advertising and Marketing
- Following its settlement with the agency, Care.com paid more than $8.5 million to the agency for consumer refunds. As of Tuesday, June 24, more than $8.1 million has been sent to consumers. The settlement resolved the FTC's action against the company for alleged deceptive practices involving its website aimed at job seekers. The practices in question were (1) misrepresentations about the income job seekers could expect to earn; and (2) deceptive website designed to prevent users from cancelling recurring subscriptions.
Wednesday, June 25, 2025
Bureau of Competition: Merger / Food and Beverages
- Is it snack time? The FTC on Wednesday announced it was ending its review of Mars, Inc.'s proposed acquisition of Kellnova. Citing the Trump Administration's "America First" philosophy, the Commission stated that its role is "to protect competition and consumers" and "get out of the way" when there is not a violation of law. The decision comes after nearly a year of intense investigation, ultimately concluding that the transaction did not meet the Clayton Act Section 7 standard for an anticompetitive merger. The deal is still pending review in the EU.
Bureau of Consumer Protection: Advertising and Marketing / Children
- The FTC announced its tentative agenda for an upcoming workshop entitled "The Dangers of 'Gender-Affirming Care' for Minors." The workshop takes place Wednesday, July 9, 2025 from 9:00AM ET – 4:00PM ET.
Bureau of Consumer Protection: Credit and Finance / Payments and Billing / Gaming
- The FTC reopened the claims process for the Epic settlement, extending the deadline to July 9, 2025. At the same time, the agency announced that Epic has refunded another $126 million to Fortnite players, bringing the total amount refunded to date to roughly $200 million of the original $245 million settlement.
Thursday, June 26, 2025
Bureau of Competition: Merger / Energy / Gasoline
- The FTC has reached a proposed consent agreement with Alimentation Couche-Tard, Inc. regarding its acquisition of retail gas stations from Giant Eagle, Inc. The agency accompanying complaint alleges that the proposed acquisition would "eliminate significant head-to-head competition . . . and increase the likelihood of coordinated effects" in the retail sale of gasoline and diesel markets of 35 local markets in Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Applying the 2023 Merger Guidelines, the FTC determined that the merger would result in a "highly concentrated market" in each of the 35 local markets, with a few even resulting in a 2 to 1 reduction. Commissioner Meador issued a statement, signaling his views on the FTC's negotiation of divestiture remedies. He stressed the importance of merging parties engaging "early, candidly, and in good faith" with FTC staff about serious competition issues, taking their "responsibility seriously and engag[ing] transparently with staff . . . ." The proposed consent agreement is now pending a 30 day public comment period.
Bureau of Consumer Protection: Credit Repair Scam / Debt Relief / Going into Business
- The FTC announced on June 26, 2025 that more than $339 million in refunds had been issued to consumers countrywide in connection with The Credit Game action. Back in 2022, we wrote about the TRO issued against The Credit Game, an allegedly unlawful credit repair business, and its owners, Michael and Valerie Rando. The company and its owners had reportedly told consumers to invest COVID-19 relief payments to repair their credit yet in turn provided services of little to no value. The FTC action resulted in an order halting the company's operations, banning the Randos from working in the credit-repair industry, and requiring them to turn over assets to provide refunds to injured consumers.
Friday, June 27, 2025
Bureau of Consumer Protection: Deceptive / Misleading Conduct
- The FTC reached a settlement with Stephen Ehrlich of Voyager Digital, a cryptocurrency company. We previously wrote about the FTC's settlement with Voyager Digital back in October 2023, but at the time, the agency and Mr. Ehrlich had not reached an agreement with respect to him in his personal capacity. In the 2023 action, the FTC alleged Mr. Ehrlich and Voyager Digital deceived customers into believing that their deposits were FDIC-insured. Customers allegedly lost more than $1 billion in cryptocurrency when Voyager Digital failed. Under this most recent settlement, Mr. Ehrlich and his wife, Francine Ehrlich, will pay $2.8 million, and will be prohibited from marketing or selling crypto related products, making misrepresentations about any product or service, making false representations to any customer of a financial institution to obtain or attempt to obtain their financial information, and disclosing nonpublic personal information about consumers without their express consent.
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