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EU Merger Remedies: A Preliminary Empirical Assessment

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Author Info
Tomaso Duso (Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB), Reichpietschufer 50, D10785 Berlin, Germany. Tel: +49 30 25491 403, Fax: +49 30 25491 444. duso@wz-berlin.de)
Klaus Gugler (University of Vienna. klaus.gugler@univie.ac.at)
Burcin Yurtoglu (University of Vienna. burcin.yurtoglu@univie.ac.at)

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Abstract

Mergers that substantially lessen competition are challenged by antitrust authorities. Instead of blocking anticompetitive transitions straight away, authorities might choose to negotiate with the merging parties and allow the transactions to proceed with modifications that restore or preserve the competition in the involved markets. We study a sample of 167 mergers that were under the European Commission’s scrutiny from 1990 to 2002. We use an event study methodology to identify the potential anticompetitive effects of mergers as well as the remedial provisions on these transactions. Stock market reactions around the day of the merger’s announcement provide information on the first question, whereas the stock market reactions around the commission’s final decision day convey information about the outcome of the bargaining process between the authority and the merging parties. We first classify mergers according to their effects on competition and then we develop hypotheses on the effects that remedies are supposed to achieve depending on the merger’s competitive outcome. We isolate several stylized facts. First, we find that remedies were not always appropriately imposed. Second, the market seems to be able to predict remedies’ effectiveness when applied in phase I. Third, the market also seems able to produce a good prior to phase II’s clearances and prohibitions, but not to remedies. This can be due either to a measurement problem or related to the increased merging firms’ bargaining power during the second phase of the merger review.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by SFB/TR 15 Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems, Free University of Berlin, Humboldt University of Berlin, University of Bonn, University of Mannheim, University of Munich in its series Discussion Papers with number 81.

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Date of creation: Jan 2006
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Handle: RePEc:trf:wpaper:81

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Related research
Keywords: Merger Control; Remedies; European Commission; Event Studies;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
L4 - Industrial Organization - - Antitrust Issues and Policies
K21 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - Antitrust Law
C12 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: General - - - Hypothesis Testing
C13 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: General - - - Estimation

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Full references

Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Patrice Bougette & Stéphane Turolla, 2006. "Merger Remedies at the European Commission: A Multinomial Logit Analysis," Working Papers 06-08, LAMETA, Universtiy of Montpellier, revised Feb 2008. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
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