Apple may soon be facing antitrust charges in Japan over its contracts with local carriers to sell iPhones.
According to Reuters, the charges stem from a report that Japan's Fair Trade Commission filed last month, which found that local carriers NTT Docomo , KDDI and Softbank were not selling their extra inventory of older versions of the iPhone to third-party retailers, limiting competition from smaller players.
NTT Docomo, KDDI and SoftBank are three of the largest wireless providers in Japan. In its annual operating report released earlier this year, NTT Docomo had over 75 million users as of April 28, 2016.
While Apple was not directly implicated in the commision's report, Reuters says regulators were also looking into the agreements the iPhone maker had struck with the carriers.
Under those agreements any surplus stock of iPhones are moved to other areas such as Hong Kong instead of being sold by smaller players in Japan.
The agreements also seem to favor the iPhone when compared to Samsung 's rival Galaxy S7 Edge, with Japanese carriers heavily discounting the iPhone on two-year contracts, compared to Galaxys even though both are similarly priced without a contract.
It remains to be seen if regulators will push for charges against the carriers or Apple. Unnamed officials told the news agency that while they believed that "the actions of the three operators alone do not account for the state of the market," it was hoping that by pressuring the carriers the contracts would be renegotiated to avoid the antitrust issue.
Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment when contacted by USA TODAY.
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