San Francisco  - Executives from Yahoo and Google are negotiating with the US Department of Justice in an effort to allay antitrust fears about their proposed advertising agreement, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.

The report said that the talks, aimed at avoiding a widely predicted antitrust suit may include a volume cap that would limit the amount of ads Google can post on the Yahoo system.

Yahoo is keen to run Google ads across its slate of websites since they generate more income by more closely targeting users' individual preferences. The company says the deal would allow it to gain hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue each year.

But advertisers say the proposal would give Google a monopoly over the online advertising space.

News of the talks came just two weeks after the companies announced they were delaying implementation of the deal in the face of heavy opposition from advertising groups in the US and beyond. (dpa)