With President-elect Trump announced as the winner of the 2024 election, the landscape of U.S. policy is poised for potential shifts that could significantly impact various sectors. Stakeholders in the real estate market are...more
11/7/2024
/ Affordable Housing ,
Antitrust Division ,
Compliance ,
Corporate Taxes ,
Deregulation ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Environmental Policies ,
Environmental Social & Governance (ESG) ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
FHFA ,
Green Energy ,
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ,
Legislative Agendas ,
PFAS ,
Popular ,
Real Estate Market ,
SALT ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Shareholders ,
Tax Cuts and Jobs Act ,
Tax Reform
With President-elect Trump announced as the winner of the 2024 election, the landscape of U.S. policy is poised for potential shifts that could significantly impact the life sciences sector. To a large degree, the extent to...more
11/7/2024
/ Antitrust Provisions ,
Bayh-Dole Act ,
Corporate Taxes ,
Drug Pricing ,
Employee Definition ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Independent Contractors ,
Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) ,
Intellectual Property Protection ,
Investment ,
Legislative Agendas ,
Life Sciences ,
NLRA ,
Non-Compete Agreements ,
SALT ,
Tariffs ,
Tax Cuts ,
Tax Cuts and Jobs Act ,
Unions ,
USPTO
We had previously questioned whether the new approach to Article 22 EUMR followed by the EC would herald a new era in EU merger control, leading to an increased number of deals being reviewed, and more importantly an...more
10/31/2024
/ Acquisition Agreements ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Competition ,
Corporate Sales Transactions ,
EU ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Government Investigations ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Merger Agreements ,
Merger Controls ,
Regulatory Requirements
As previously reported, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”), with the concurrence of the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (“DOJ” and, together with FTC, the “agencies”), recently finalized expansive...more
10/30/2024
/ Acquisition Agreements ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Competition ,
Corporate Sales Transactions ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Merger Agreements ,
Merger Controls ,
Pre-Merger Filing Requirements ,
Premerger Notifications
On October 10, 2024, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) published the final version of changes affecting Hart-Scott-Rodino (“HSR”) reporting requirements, which were the subject of a previous Notice of Proposed Rulemaking....more
The U.S. agencies concluded 11 significant merger investigations in the first half of 2024—just one shy of the total concluded in all of 2023. Activity has picked up considerably since last year but is still below the...more
8/7/2024
/ Abandonment ,
Consent Decrees ,
EU ,
EUMR ,
European Commission ,
European Court of Justice (ECJ) ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Investigations ,
Mergers ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Settlement ,
The Clayton Act
District court finds minority investors in companies accused of antitrust violations are not liable solely by virtue of holding a minority ownership stake.
To obtain injunctive relief, the FTC must allege specific facts...more
Only 12 significant merger investigations concluded in 2023—a drop of 40 percent from just last year and by far the lowest in DAMITT history. This observed and verifiable drop sharply contrasts with recent reports that...more
Tracking the economy’s continued growth and the resulting increase in GNP, the HSR filing thresholds increased by about 7.3 percent.
The new minimum size-of-transaction threshold increased from US$111.4 million to...more
The Merger Guidelines lower the market concentration threshold for the presumption that a merger is illegal.
Deals that place combined market shares above 30 percent with a significant increase in concentration are...more
United States -
All significant U.S. merger investigations concluded in either a complaint or an abandoned transaction. Four of the last five quarters have now concluded without any consent agreements, demonstrating the...more
Dechert’s antitrust group submitted comments today to U.S. antitrust agencies on their proposed top-to-bottom overhaul of premerger antitrust filings made under the Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Act. The Federal Trade Commission...more
All significant U.S. merger investigations concluded in either a complaint or an abandoned transaction. Three of four quarters over the last year have now concluded without any consent agreements, demonstrating the agencies’...more
On July 19, 2023, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) (collectively, the agencies) issued their long-awaited draft Merger Guidelines. The draft Merger Guidelines, once finalized, will...more
The recent proposal would require significantly more information to be provided up front to the U.S. antitrust agencies.
The new rules will likely take effect in Q4 2023 or Q1 2024....more
7/6/2023
/ Antitrust Division ,
Certifications ,
Competition ,
Data Collection ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Mergers ,
NAICS ,
Premerger Notifications
Sixty percent of significant investigations concluded with a complaint or abandoned transaction in 2022. This shatters last year’s record of 37 percent. The 10 complaints filed in 2022 are also a DAMITT record. Those are...more
Following a robust growth in GNP, the HSR filings thresholds increased by about 10.3 percent.
The new minimum size-of-transaction threshold increased from US$101.0 million to US$111.4 million....more
The newly enacted Merger Filing Fee Modernization Act significantly changes filing fees for HSR filings.
The changes are expected to take effect in 2023; the exact date is still to be announced....more
In both our DAMITT 2021 Report and our Q1 2022 Report, we warned that parties to transactions subject to significant merger investigations were more likely to see the FTC or DOJ sue to block their deal or push them to abandon...more
7/26/2022
/ Antitrust Provisions ,
Competition ,
Corporate Sales Transactions ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Statistics ,
EU ,
European Merger Control Regulation ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Government Investigations ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Investment Opportunities ,
Merger Controls
In the U.S., “significant” merger investigations include Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) Act reportable transactions for which the result of the investigation by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) or the Antitrust Division of the...more
4/21/2022
/ Antitrust Investigations ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Competition ,
Corporate Sales Transactions ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
EU ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Merger Agreements ,
Merger Controls ,
Settlement Agreements
The number of significant U.S. merger investigations concluded in the first year of the Biden administration was in line with the average observed during the Trump administration....more
On January 21, 2022, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) announced that the dollar-based thresholds applicable to the Hart-Scott-Rodino (“HSR”) premerger notification program will be raised about 9.7% percent from the...more
On December 22, 2021, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that they had entered into settlements with Clarence L. Werner and Biglari Holdings Inc. (Biglari)...more
12/28/2021
/ Acquisition Agreements ,
Antitrust Division ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Failure-to-File ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Filing Requirements ,
Fines ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Investment ,
Regulatory Requirements ,
Regulatory Violations ,
Settlement Agreements ,
Voting Securities
Key Facts - United States - Dechert has yet to see an increase in concluded significant U.S. merger investigations despite a surge in merger filings that began in the fall of 2020. Instead, we continue to see a decrease in...more
The Supreme Court has ruled that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) does not have authority under Section 13(b) of the FTC Act to seek disgorgement or restitution from defendants. The agency has increasingly relied on this...more