Mercado Libre, Marcos Galperin’s company, responded to the complaint that the banks made through their Modo virtual wallet. Today, the entities accused the firm of abuse of dominant position. Tonight, with a statement, Mercado Libre warned that the company “complies with all current regulations” and that the banks are being investigated for alleged cartelization.
“Modo is a company made up of 36 banks, which is being investigated for cartelization and discrimination by the National Commission for the Defense of Competition (CNDC); for promoting practices that affect the fintech industry and millions of consumers; for limiting transfers from bank accounts (CBU) to virtual accounts (CVU) and for repeating practices that the CNDC had already considered anti-competitive.”
In that sense, Galperin’s firm considered “It is striking that in 2020, the same banks set up another company (MODO) with identical objectives to avoid competing with each other and now they are again denounced for cartelizing.”
Modo reported that there would be “anti-competitive practices” by Mercado Pago that would presumably fall within the figures of “abuse of a dominant position of an exclusionary type.” In other words, they accuse it of blocking or preventing other actors from competing with its services.
One of the issues is linked to the interoperability of QR codes, a provision of the Central Bank (BCRA) which establishes that all QR codes must allow credit card payments from any wallet, regardless of who is the firm providing those QRs. According to Modo’s complaint, “Mercado Libre prevents competing wallets from paying with their QR or through their payment gateway (e-commerce).”
With information from news