Boats Group, the Miami-based owner of Boat Trader, YachtWorld and boats.com, is facing a federal class action lawsuit accusing it of monopolising the market for online boat listings and marketing services in the United States.
The complaint, filed in the Southern District of Florida by Brill Maritime Inc, which does business as Export Yacht Sales, alleges that Boats Group has “willfully acquired, maintained and expanded monopoly power in this market by engaging in exclusionary and anticompetitive conduct, including the serial acquisitions of its main competitors, unilateral price increases, restrictive contractual terms, and practices that hinder entry and expansion by rival platforms.”
The lawsuit, which seeks injunctive relief and damages under the Sherman Act, the Florida Antitrust Act of 1980, and the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act, claims that Boats Group controls about 75 per cent of the global market for online boat listing and marketing services, with a similarly dominant share in the US. The company’s platforms attract more than 65mn annual visitors, which the lawsuit says gives sellers “unmatched exposure to serious boat buyers.”
According to the filing, Boats Group uses subscription agreements with sellers that “contain exclusive dealing provisions that either prohibit or strongly discourage sellers, particularly brokers and dealers, from listing their inventory on competing platforms.” It alleges these practices have prevented competitors from gaining traction, citing the International Yacht Brokers Association’s launch of its Yachtr platform in 2024 “in direct response to Boats Group’s escalating and anticompetitive pricing.” The lawsuit states that “despite IYBA’s institutional backing and market familiarity, Yachtr has struggled to gain listings and user traffic due to the industry’s high barriers to entry and to Boats Group’s entrenched dominance, strong network effects, and restrictive contractual practices.”
The lawsuit details steep price increases over the past decade. “The plaintiff’s combined monthly cost of listing on Boat Trader and YachtWorld was approximately $1,004. By 2017, these prices rose to $1,221,” it states. “Between 2018 and 2024, pricing surged again, reaching $2,794 in 2021 and $5,128 by 2024, a more than 400% increase over a decade. In 2025, Boat Trader alone charged $2,900 per month for its services.” Export Yacht Sales says it has been “forced to pay supracompetitive prices for essential marketing services, with effectively zero viable alternatives available.”
The filing alleges that these practices harm both brokers and buyers. “Boats Group’s exclusionary behaviour has suppressed competition, harmed sellers and brokerages, and distorted the structure and dynamics of the online boat sales marketplace,” the lawsuit states. It adds that “buyers of marine vessels have sustained antitrust injury as a consequence of Boats Group’s exclusionary conduct with the supracompetitive fees imposed on brokers and dealers passed through to buyers in the form of higher prices.”
Lawyers for Export Yacht Sales said in a statement to Reuters that by “monopolising the market for online boat listing services, Boats Group has been able to impose steep and sustained price increases, forcing brokers to pay inflated subscription fees without viable alternatives.” Attorneys for Export Yacht Sales told Business Insider that the lawsuit “highlights the severe impact that Boats Group’s anticompetitive conduct has had on this industry.”
The case, Brill Maritime Inc d/b/a Export Yacht Sales v. Boats Group LLC, was filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida (No. 1:25-cv-23663-RKA). It seeks to “restore competitive conditions” and recover damages for a proposed class of thousands of US brokers, dealers and other sellers who purchased subscription-based listing services from Boats Group since 2014.
Boats Group and its parent company, Permira, have so far issued no comment. Permira, a European private equity firm, is not named as a defendant in the case.
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