Summer is “a boom time for ice cream makers”, said Agence France-Presse – but in Japan, some of the country’s biggest firms are feeling the heat.Officials from the Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) have raided six firms on suspicion of colluding to hike prices in a cartel. Staff are believed to have “sent emails or met up for years to coordinate the timing and size” of the increases, said an anonymous source, violating anti-monopoly laws.

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