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Antitrust M&A Snapshot | Q4 2023

Topics covered in this edition:

  • New Merger Guidelines Released
  • FTC Focused on Pharmaceutical Companies
  • FTC Targets “Moat-Building” Mergers
  • Fifth Circuit Fuels FTC’s Vertical Mergers Agenda
  • FTC Losing Streak Reverses During the Fourth Quarter
  • Ex post Review in the Merger Control Sphere Occurring More and More Frequently

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The Fix Is In – Key Learnings From Recent Vertical Merger Challenges

Vertical mergers are inherently more difficult for the government to litigate than horizonal mergers. After not litigating a vertical merger case since the 1970s, the Federal Trade Commission and the US Department of Justice have recently tried several matters.

In this Westlaw Today article, Jon Dubrow, Stephen Wu, Matt Evola and Bailey Sanders discuss key insights from these cases and provide useful guidance for companies contemplating such transactions.

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New FTC, DOJ Merger Guidelines Create Challenges and Opportunities

The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and US Department of Justice Antitrust Division (DOJ) issued their updated Merger Guidelines on December 18, 2023. These guidelines represent a significantly more enforcement-oriented approach than the prior guidelines, and they largely follow the contours of draft guidelines released in July 2023. Companies should be aware of the Merger Guidelines and their implications as they formulate strategies for assessing potential merger and acquisition options.

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Cartel Corner | July 2023

In the first half of 2023, antitrust enforcers remained remarkably busy both in the United States (US) and across the European Union (EU). The US Department of Justice’s (DOJ’s) Antitrust Division (Division) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) have continued their aggressive and novel effort to drag antitrust enforcement into the labor markets. The DOJ Procurement Collusion Strike Force (PCSF) has pursued its crackdown on antitrust and fraud involving government procurement with a number of recent cases. And DOJ has pushed the boundaries under Section 2 of the Sherman Act—both by revitalizing the criminal provisions of the law and by pursuing “attempts” to monopolize criminally. The European Union has also kept the pressure on those doing business overseas, imposing significant fines in recent matters and upgrading its online leniency program to make it easier for companies to report wrongdoing.

In this installment of Cartel Corner, we examine this continued aggressiveness toward antitrust enforcement. While these government enforcement efforts have not always been successful, they have nonetheless reframed the landscape for many companies and individuals. What was once thought of as a civil antitrust violation at worst—or no violation at all—is now often pursued criminally. And antitrust enforcers are speaking in more strident tones as they attempt to remake, in certain ways, the way companies do business in the United States and abroad.

Whether antitrust enforcers are ultimately successful remains to be seen. Nonetheless, the trend is real, and it is one that all companies should be prepared to address in the weeks and months to come.

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2023 Regulatory Forecast: Antitrust & Competition

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the US Department of Justice (DOJ) pursued aggressive antitrust and competition enforcement agendas this past year and show no signs of slowing down in 2023. Prepare for the year ahead by reviewing our 2023 Regulatory Forecast for the antitrust and competition space.

Click the links below to download a one-pager of takeaways for each area.

Antitrust & Competition | Merger ControlThe Biden administration prioritized aggressive antitrust merger enforcement in 2022, especially in the healthcare, labor, consumer and technology sectors. Learn how this trend will continue in 2023 as the FTC and DOJ expand their toolbox to challenge transactions.

Antitrust LitigationIn 2022, the DOJ and FTC took boundary-shifting antitrust enforcement positions and proved they are not afraid to pursue novel legal theories. The DOJ alone has more open grand jury investigations and charged more cases in 2022 than it has in decades. The DOJ and the FTC also requested historic budget increases to support their aggressive agendas. Additional resources mean more regulators are available to investigate and litigate alleged anticompetitive conduct. Find out more about the aggressive enforcement by the antitrust agencies and private plaintiffs that is expected to continue in 2023.

Consumer ProtectionEnforcement by the FTC, among other consumer protection regulators, was particularly vigorous in 2022 and the trend is expected to continue in 2023. In light of the increased regulatory focus on social media, marketing and advertising, businesses should be aware of the ever-evolving guidance in this realm. Read about the proposed rulemaking and revisions on the horizon this year.




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DOJ to Merging Parties: The Time of “Underenforcement” is Over; Fix-It-First or Risk Being Challenged

WHAT HAPPENED

During a conference last week, Ryan Danks, Director of Civil Enforcement at the US Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division (DOJ), suggested that merging parties—not the antitrust enforcement agencies—should devise fixes for allegedly anticompetitive transactions.

Danks stated “that something is broken about the way that the antitrust community talks about remedies in the context of mergers, where parties will bring in a three-to-two or four-to-three or even a two-to-one [transactions] and say ‘now we want you, government, to work with us to figure out how to fix this’ . . . that’s not our job. Our job is to maintain competition.”

Danks added that merging parties bear the responsibility for remedying their anticompetitive transactions and have more information on the businesses, allowing them to formulate strong solutions. Such “fix-it-first” approaches may allow merging parties to complete their transactions quicker, avoiding lengthy merger reviews and consent decree negotiations.

Danks also suggested that “the simplest remedy . . . is to just stop an anticompetitive transaction from occurring,” strongly hinting that today’s DOJ would rather challenge an entire transaction than work with the parties on devising a remedy to address specific competitive concerns in limited product or geographic markets.

Jonathan Kanter, Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division, conveyed similar views in two speeches last week, making it clear that merger enforcement at the DOJ will become even more vigorous.

On September 13, 2022, Kanter:

  • Warned that “[c]ompanies considering mergers that may harm competition should know that the Antitrust Division will not back down from a fight so long as that threat remains.”
  • Emphasized that the Clayton Act’s “expansive definition of antitrust liability” requires the government only to prove that a transaction’s effect “may be substantially to lessen competition.” According to Kanter, antitrust agencies have, for too long, “underenforced a statute that was meant to be prophylactic” by focusing on concrete evidence of a merger’s effect on prices.

On September 16, 2022, Kanter said that antitrust enforcers “can no longer be so cautious to avoid overenforcement that [they] intentionally underenforce the law.”

Moving away from negotiating settlements that allow transactions to proceed while resolving anticompetitive issues is part of a trend of dramatic policy and procedural changes at both the DOJ and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) designed to discourage mergers and acquisitions (M&A), such as:

  • Suspending early termination of the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act (HSR) waiting period for transactions that do not raise competitive issues
  • Sending merging parties “close at your own risk” letters, informing the parties that antitrust investigations are ongoing despite expiration of the HSR waiting period
  • Insisting on inclusion of prior approval/prior notice provisions in all merger settlements
  • Including new topics, such as the impact on labor and environment, in Second Requests and adding additional hurdles to modifying Second Requests.

WHAT THIS MEANS FOR MERGING PARTIES

Merging parties should increasingly consider resolving likely competitive issues with their transaction before the antitrust [...]

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DOJ Antitrust Head Signals Aggressive Enforcement against Private Equity Transactions

US antitrust enforcers have signaled that private equity firms are the prime targets for upcoming aggressive antitrust merger enforcement. In a recent interview, US Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter stated that the motive of a private equity firm may be “designed to hollow out or roll up an industry and essentially cash out,” which “is often very much at odds with the law, and very much at odds with the competition we’re trying to protect.”[1] His comment comes after Lina Khan, the current Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chairwoman, stated that private equity roll-ups would be a focal point for the FTC.[2] It is not entirely unsurprising that progressive antitrust enforcers are focusing on private equity after the industry announced a record 14,730 deals last year globally worth $1.2 trillion, which was nearly double the previous high in 2007.[3] The above comments provide several key takeaways for stakeholders going forward:

  • As a general matter, these statements further solidify the notion that antitrust merger enforcement is going to continue to be extremely aggressive and indicate that the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FTC may closely scrutinize private equity transactions even if there is no obvious horizontal or vertical issue. For example, the DOJ and the FTC have already started investigating less traditional theories of harm, such as the impact on labor and the environment.
  • Private equity firms should expect the potential for heightened scrutiny in instances where a private equity firm has engaged in serial acquisitions within the same industry (known as roll-up transactions), especially in healthcare-related fields. It will be important for stakeholders to not only evaluate the current acquisition for competitive issues, but to also consider the impact of a long-term “roll-up” plan and its influence on pricing, service, and quality.
  • Watch for agencies to bring more Clayton Act Section 8 cases, which prohibits interlocking directorates (aka a single firm appointing officers and directors at multiple competitors).[4] Private equity firms often will appoint personnel to the boards of the firm’s portfolio companies, which may consist of horizontal competitors. Going forward, these appointments will require additional attention to avoid running afoul of Section 8.
  • The DOJ and the FTC will also have an enhanced focus on the impact of private equity firms acting as divestiture buyers when the agency orders merging parties to divest assets to preserve competition. Assistant Attorney General Kanter stated, “[I]n many instances, divestitures that were supposed to address a competitive problem have ended up fueling additional competitive problems.”[5]

While the degree to which agencies will more closely scrutinize private equity transactions remains unclear, it is crucial for private equity firms to engage antitrust counsel early in the transaction process both to evaluate the transaction at hand, as well as any future transactions that may, together, bring about enhanced regulatory scrutiny.

[1] Stefania Palma and James Fontanella-Khan, “Crackdown on buyout deals coming, warns [...]

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THE LATEST: Antitrust Umps Throw Out Information Exchanges Relating To LA Dodgers Broadcast Rights

The Department of Justice (DOJ) reinforces the perils of competitor information exchanges by challenging alleged communications between DirecTV and other video programmers related to broadcast rights for Los Angeles (LA) Dodgers baseball.

WHAT HAPPENED:
  • In November 2016, the DOJ filed an antitrust complaint against DirecTV. DOJ alleged:
    • The LA Dodgers sought to sell broadcast rights to their baseball games to cable and satellite TV companies.
    • DirecTV was a potential bidder for Dodgers’ rights, as were other cable companies operating in the LA area.
    • DirectTV entered into agreements with competing cable companies to exchange information relating to their negotiations with the LA Dodgers.
    • As a result of the information learned through these information exchanges, the various potential bidders did not compete aggressively for Dodgers broadcast rights because they gained information about their rivals’ negotiating positions.
    • The negotiations dragged on, and since no programmer had broadcast rights, people in LA could not watch Dodgers games on television.
    • Notably, DOJ did not allege that the broadcasters reached any price fixing or market allocation agreement.
  • In late March, DirecTV settled with the DOJ and entered into a consent order that precludes it from providing non-public, competitively sensitive information to a competitor or seeking such information from competitors.
    • There are exceptions to allow exchanges in connection with legitimate due diligence, collaborative ventures or commercial vendor/vendee arrangements.
WHAT THIS MEANS:
  • While not surprising, this case reinforces that information exchanges between competitors creates substantial antitrust risk.
  • Exchanges can create antitrust exposure even if there is no agreement between the competitors on pricing or other competitive decisions, and compliance programs should reinforce this principle.
  • Agreements or coordination among buyers raise the same types of competitive issues as agreements among sellers.
    • In this case, the Dodgers were the sellers and DirecTV and programmers were the buyers.
    • Another recent example is the FTC/DOJ guidance issued last fall on anticompetitive agreements among employers, such as “no poach” or “no solicit” agreements, which DOJ stated it may prosecute criminally if they are “naked” agreements, unrelated to a legitimate activity such as a joint venture.
  • The antitrust laws protect the competitive process rather than low prices.
    • A competitive market for the sale of products often leads to lower priced goods and services.
    • In this case, DOJ alleged that DirecTV and the other providers exchanged information to prevent the Dodgers from raising the price for Dodgers’ broadcasts, but that did not legitimize the conduct.



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