PayPal was just fined $311,000 by a UK regulator over its $2.2 billion iZettle acquisition
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AP PayPal CEO Dan Schulman.
The UK's competition regulator has just slapped PayPal with a £250,000 ($311,000) fine over its $2.2 billion acquisition of payments firm iZettle.
iZettle is a Swedish company best known for offering plug-in card readers, and point-of-service hardware, which lets small businesses take credit card payments. American payments giant PayPal acquired the business last May, a day before iZettle was due to file for an IPO.On Tuesday, the CMA said PayPal had breached the order and cross-promoted the iZettle business to customers in Europe, including in the UK.
It said in a statement: "Despite its assurances ... PayPal conducted cross-selling pilot campaigns (intended to target customers in France and Germany) that led to it contacting UK potential customers."The impact of the breach was that, at the very least, UK potential customers could have perceived that the two businesses were integrated and were not being maintained separately."The CMA cleared the acquisition in June, but is still fining the company for breaching its order. The regulator said it considered the £250,000 fine to be a proportionate penalty, given the severity of the breach. It is significantly below the maximum penalty of 5% of PayPal's turnover.
Business Insider has contacted PayPal for comment.
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