EU prepares new Google fine in 3-front Big Tech crackdown

The European Commission is preparing to issue a new round of fines against Google, the Financial Times reported Wednesday, escalating enforcement of the European Union's Digital Markets Act as regulators in Germany and Switzerland pursue parallel actions against the search giant.

"The commission is signaling that noncompliance with the DMA carries real financial consequences, and this is only the beginning," said Elena Fischer, a former EU economic policy analyst at Politico Europe now covering regulation for Edgen. "The cumulative effect of multiple proceedings across jurisdictions is what keeps legal teams up at night."

The new fine, whose amount has not yet been disclosed, would add to the more than 8.25 billion euros in penalties the EU has imposed on Google across three prior antitrust cases since 2017 — a 4.34 billion euro penalty for Android antitrust violations in 2018, a 2.42 billion euro fine for shopping search favoritism in 2017, and a 1.49 billion euro sanction for AdSense advertising restrictions in 2019. Alphabet shares fell about 1 percent in early trading Tuesday as the Swiss review emerged, and the stock faces additional pressure from the EU escalation.

The Brussels action comes as national regulators widen their own scrutiny. Germany's media authority ZAK ruled this month that Google's AI Overviews and Perplexity AI are subject to the country's media laws, concluding that AI-generated search summaries constitute the company's own content rather than a display of third-party information. A Munich court had already found Google could be held liable for false information produced by its AI Overview feature. Separately, Switzerland's COMCO competition authority opened a preliminary review into Google's decision to remove the search-engine selection screen from Android device setup for Swiss users, a feature still available in European Economic Area markets.

Why the regulatory pressure is intensifying

The DMA, which took full effect in March 2024, designated Google as a "gatekeeper" subject to strict obligations on self-preferencing, data sharing, and interoperability. The commission has signaled it views Google's compliance measures as insufficient, particularly around how the company displays search results and promotes its own services. The German regulator's argument that AI Overviews reduce the visibility of traditional website links, placing independent media at a competitive disadvantage, mirrors concerns the EU has raised in its own proceedings.

The last time the commission escalated enforcement against a gatekeeper under the DMA was in June 2024, when it opened noncompliance investigations into Apple and Meta alongside Google. Apple subsequently opened the iPhone to alternative app stores in the EU, while Meta adjusted its "pay or consent" advertising model. Google has maintained that its AI-powered summaries enhance the search experience and has said it would appeal the German ruling.

What comes next for Google and Big Tech

The commission has not set a date for the formal announcement of the fine, but internal documents cited by the Financial Times suggest the process is in its final stages. Google could face daily penalty payments of up to 5 percent of its average daily worldwide turnover for continued noncompliance under the DMA's enforcement framework. The company also faces the risk of structural remedies, including potential separation of its search business from other services, though such measures remain a last resort under EU law.

For investors, the regulatory trajectory is unambiguous. The EU is pursuing enforcement on three fronts — the new DMA fine, the German media-law ruling, and the Swiss competition review — while the U.S. Department of Justice has separately won a landmark antitrust ruling against Google's search monopoly in August 2024, with remedies still being litigated. The combined regulatory pressure introduces a sustained legal overhang for Alphabet that could weigh on valuation multiples even as the company's core advertising and cloud businesses continue to generate strong cash flow.

This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.