HEXUS.sharewatch: Google dips on antitrust news

The US Federal Trade Commission joined the EU in deciding to have a formal look at how Google goes about its business late last week. The main focus, if reports are accurate, will be on whether Google deliberately intervenes to ensure companies that compete with its own products feature artificially far down on search results.

Google's shares fell around a percent on Friday, when the news broke and was eventually formally acknowledged. While the potential consequences of the investigation are severe - big fines, or even forced corporate changes - this action has been anticipated for a while and will be held up by the lawyers for some time, so markets are probably not anticipating anything substantial happening for a while.

Meanwhile ARM's shares had another good week, probably helped by stories such as this one on Motley Fool: Is ARM Holdings The Next Intel?

While we forsee a bright future for ARM, this might be overstating the case somewhat, especially when you consider how different their business models are. Intel designs, makes and sells chips, while ARM only licenses its designs. As a consequence ARM's revenues are much smaller than Intel's, despite the growing ubiquity of its designs.