Three of the nation’s largest egg producers agreed to a settlement brokered by the U.S.
Department of Justice and 17 state attorneys general over an alleged scheme to rig a key egg price benchmark, with the deal requiring 53 million eggs in food bank donations and $3.3 million in payments
The proposed settlement still requires court approval. According to the settlement, the alleged scheme ran from roughly June 2022 through March 2025, during which Cal-Maine Foods, Versova/Centrum, and Hickman’s Egg Ranch worked in concert to sway the daily price quotes that Urner Barry — a pricing service whose egg benchmark underpins many supply contracts — publishes each day. By submitting coordinated bids to inflate the benchmark, the companies artificially raised prices paid by retailers and consumers nationwide, the coalition alleged.
In one documented example, Hickman’s then-chief executive emailed executives at Versova and Cal-Maine in December 2022 urging them to submit “strong bids, early and often” to push prices higher, according to the New York attorney general’s office. The three companies then submitted dozens of higher-priced bids, prompting Urner Barry to raise its price quotes. Once the three companies became aware of the Justice Department’s probe in March 2025, benchmark egg price quotes fell sharply, according to federal officials.