Swedish court orders Google to pay $1.5 billion to Klarna’s PriceRunner

The Patent and Market Court in Stockholm on July 1 ordered Alphabet’s Google to pay around 14.3 billion Swedish crowns, roughly $1.5 billion, in antitrust damages to PriceRunner, the price comparison company owned by Klarna, Reuters reported. The court found that Google had illegally favored its own price comparison service over competing offerings for many years, according to a statement from the court.

Including accrued interest, the award totals $1.97 billion, Klarna said in a release cited by PYMNTS. A court official, Alderman Linda Kullberg, said the damages are the largest ever awarded in a Swedish competition case, according to Reuters, though the sum falls well short of the roughly 78 billion crowns PriceRunner had sought including interest.

“When markets work well, everyone benefits,” Dan Greaves, Klarna’s head of communications and policy, said in the company’s release.

PriceRunner sued Google in 2022, seeking compensation for profits it said it lost in Britain since 2008 and in Sweden and Denmark since 2013. The claim followed a 2017 decision by the European Commission, which fined Google 2.42 billion euros for abusing its dominance by favoring its Google Shopping service in search results. The Court of Justice of the European Union upheld that decision in 2024. Klarna acquired PriceRunner in 2022.

Google told American Banker that it is evaluating its legal options. Klarna’s counsel Pontus Scherp told Reuters that an appeal could stretch over years, meaning no payment is expected in the near term. Klarna also noted that any final award would be reduced by sharing arrangements with former PriceRunner investors and the company’s litigation funder.

Klarna shares rose about 7.5 percent after the ruling, while Alphabet slipped about 0.4 percent in US premarket trading, Reuters reported.