Shoppers could hardly find eggs in stores early last year, a period when producers said avian flu had decimated the hen population. When eggs were available, they were as expensive as they'd ever been.

It turns out the culprit was at least partly market manipulation, according to antitrust enforcers. Three large egg producers coordinated their bids to an egg exchange -- a hub of wholesale egg trading -- in order to inflate a benchmark price that influences retail prices, according to the Justice Department and 17 states that investigated the conduct.

Cal-Maine Foods, Hickman's Egg Ranch and Versova agreed to settle the claims by donating more than 50 million eggs to food banks and paying $3.3 million to New York and other states that investigated the alleged misconduct, according to court records. The deal requires court approval.

Egg companies significantly hiked prices in 2022 and again in 2024 and 2025 after a severe supply shortage that the industry attributed to avian flu. Prices hit a record high of more than $6 a dozen at grocery stores in the spring of 2025.

Antitrust enforcers said the companies worked to rig the benchmark price from 2022 to 2025. Executives spoke by phone and sent text messages to each other urging how they should nudge prices higher by "posting strong bids, early and often." An executive of an egg cooperative, unnamed in the court complaint, said the group should "bid like they vote in Chicago, early and often."

The companies also coordinated off-exchange egg trades at premium prices, which were submitted to the middleman that tallies the benchmark price.

Cal-Maine, the country's largest egg producer, denied wrongdoing. It said communications cited in the complaint -- made by a former employee -- did not affect egg prices, and that the company's conduct was lawful and in the best interests of the market.

"The period reviewed by the DOJ was a particularly challenging time," Cal-Maine CEO Sherman Miller said in a statement.

Versova, which has had about 25 million egg-laying hens die from the bird flu outbreak, also said it denies wrongdoing and reached the settlement to focus on its business.

Glenn Hickman, the former chief executive of Hickman's Egg Ranch, declined to comment. The company was bought by a joint venture between meatpacking giant JBS and a Brazilian egg company, called Mantiqueira USA. In a statement, the company said the conduct at Hickman's predates the acquisition, but the settlement resolves all allegations against Hickman's.

The bird flu outbreak has resulted in the deaths of roughly 200 million U.S. chickens, turkeys and egg-laying hens since it began in 2022, according to the Agriculture Department. Entire poultry farms are routinely destroyed after a single case is found to try to prevent further spread of the disease.

The industry has denied price gouging, arguing it was a classic case of supply and demand, where limited supply and high demand lead to higher prices.

Egg companies say they were largely unable to keep up with rebuilding their flocks amid ongoing outbreaks, the holiday season and panic buying by retailers, consumers and restaurants eager to secure egg supplies.

This past winter, the disease largely passed over large egg-laying hen farms that can house millions of birds in a single location, but still led to the death of millions of turkeys. Bird flu cases have largely subsided in recent months and are sparse in the summer months.

This pause in cases has allowed egg companies to rebuild their flocks, leading to a fall in egg prices. Retail egg prices averaged about $2 per dozen nationwide in May, according to the Labor Department. Prices were 35% lower compared to the same time the previous year.

Write to Dave Michaels at dave.michaels@wsj.com and Patrick Thomas at patrick.thomas@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

June 30, 2026 12:08 ET (16:08 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.