A U.S. probe into fertilizer giants could ripple through Canada

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Fertilizer prices are squeezing North American farmers, and they’re putting Canada’s role in the supply chain under fresh scrutiny. The U.S. Department of Justice has launched an antitrust investigation into top commercial fertilizer producers, including Canada’s Nutrien, over concerns that alleged price-fixing may have raised costs for U.S. farmers.

“The issue is the fact that Nutrien is one of two companies that, with regard to potash — the other being Mosaic — have that 90 per cent market share,” said Deputy Agriculture Secretary Stephen Vaden.

“While having a situation where there is a monopoly or duopoly is not by itself … a violation of the antitrust laws, it does give rise to legitimate questions about how the beneficiaries of that, in this case, duopoly, (operate).”

Vaden said U.S. authorities want to see more competition, more fertilizer supply, and fair prices.

The investigation follows a tough year for fertilizer prices and farmers. For most of 2025, fertilizer imports to the U.S. faced significant tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump, which raised nearly $110 million in revenue, according to the North Dakota State University’s Agricultural Trade Monitor. Canadian potash initially took a beating with a 25 per cent tariff, but that was quickly lowered. Between January and June 2025, fertilizer prices in the U.S. rose as much as 39 per cent, and since it is a core agricultural input, American farmers have borne the brunt. High farming costs helped fuel a 46 per cent rise last year in U.S. farm bankruptcies .

Outcry from farmers and consumers led the U.S. administration to ease tariffs on some farm goods in November, and the newly imposed Section 122 tariffs — introduced after the Supreme Court rejected Trump’s tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act — exempt most fertilizers. Still, prices remain high. In January, potash prices were up 11 per cent year over year, and UAN28, a liquid nitrogen fertilizer, was up more than 25 per cent. With the planting season looming, the ability to meet these rising costs is a massive concern.

“(Farmers’) margins just get eroded and eroded, and there’s not a whole lot they can do about it,” said Sarah Carden, research and policy director at Farm Action, an industry watchdog and advocacy group.

“We’re very happy to see the probe. It’s something we’ve been pushing for for a long time.”

Because there are just a handful of firms dominating the nitrogen, phosphate, and potash markets, she said, the market is prone to price surges, especially in response to shocks like the Ukraine war, the war in Iran, and tariffs.

“With the Middle East providing 30 per cent or so of global fertilizer needs, and it being an area of general unrest, we just need to anticipate that we’re going to continue to see shocks of this nature over time,” Carden said.

“Our concern is that … some of these price increases may not be justified by the extent of the global disruptions.”

“Fertilizer corporations may be using these shocks as opportunities to profit.”

That is what the DOJ will be investigating, said Diana Moss, VP and director of competition policy at the Progressive Policy Institute.

The case focuses on whether the few firms involved in the critical agricultural supply chain have wielded enough market influence to tighten output and inflate prices.

“The job of an antitrust case is to isolate anti-competitive conduct from all this other stuff,” she said, referring to tariffs and international shocks.

But the feds face a big challenge. Investigators have to prove that price increases were not the result of other market factors, and they need hard evidence.

“The courts … are unfortunately looking more and more for what we call smoking gun evidence,” Moss explained, such as documentation of communication between firms or audio recordings pointing to collusion.

But that’s not always how collusion works, she argued, noting that companies often have strong incentives to follow each other on prices.

“Because it’s in their joint interest to keep prices high, that can materialize into an anti-competitive scheme.”

So in big cartel cases, authorities look for patterns over time — signs that firms kept prices stable and then broke ranks when one company cheated to profit more than the others. They also look for coded signals in public statements or investor calls that suggest coordination.

Vaden explained that the industry’s high prices should normally attract new competition. If outsiders think they can enter the market and still profit, it suggests that incumbent firms may have been keeping prices high.

“That … raises questions about what the two current largest market participants have been up to in the past five years,” he said.

But Vaden has been encouraged by Nutrien’s outreach about the probe.

“Nutrien affirmatively reached out, and they came in here and met with me. They brought their CEO, we had a private conversation, and we’ve had a couple of conversations since.”

“That is a credit to them — that on hearing questions asked, their first instinct wasn’t to lawyer up and shut up; it was to come in and have a conversation. I welcome that,” he added, noting Mosaic has not done this. (Nutrien declined to comment for this article.)

If a collusion case is brought, it could bring criminal fines and, in some cases, prison time. But another remedy, Moss said, is the potential to break up the companies, though that is uncommon.

At least two class-action lawsuits have also been filed against the same fertilizer producers, alleging price-fixing. These will run parallel to the DOJ probe and could continue regardless of what the federal investigators find.

Agricultural trade access and supply-chain stability have long been part of CUSMA talks , so the questions hanging over fertilizer producers — particularly Nutrien — could surface in this summer’s talks.

Diana Moss agreed that any antitrust findings could have trade implications, but she said antitrust enforcement and CUSMA dispute settlement are separate tracks. Either way, because DOJ probes may take several months or longer, any meaningful finding is unlikely to land before the July CUSMA review.   

National Post

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