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New CMA Merger Assessment Guidelines inspired by Lear’s recommendations

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has updated its Merger Assessment Guidelines to make its approach to merger assessment more in line with recent developments, especially in the digital landscape. In revising its Guidelines, the CMA paid particular attention to the role that changes in technology have been playing in shaping the way firms compete with one another. The new Guidelines are built on Lear’s recommendations on how to approach the assessment of digital mergers included in the “Ex-post Assessment of Merger Control Decisions in Digital Markets” report. These recommendations were broadly meant to address the risk of under-enforcement in digital markets. Continue reading New CMA Merger Assessment Guidelines inspired by Lear’s recommendations →

THE MODE OF COMPETITION: WHERE TO START AND WHEN YOU STOP IN MERGER ANALYSIS

The best way to begin an economic analysis is to ask a relevant question. In a merger analysis the relevant question is: will the post-merger new entity have the ability and the incentive to exert a higher market power? But which analyses are best suited to answer these questions? This note argues that the best way to make this call is to understand first how firms compete in the market, something economists refer to as the “mode of competition”. Continue reading THE MODE OF COMPETITION: WHERE TO START AND WHEN YOU STOP IN MERGER ANALYSIS →

PAOLO SPEAKS AT THE EC WEBINAR ON THE “EX POST ECONOMIC EVALUATION OF EUROPEAN COMPETITION POLICY”, JUNE 23 2020

The webinar has been organised by the European Commission (EC) on the occasion of the publication by Wolters Kluwer of an edited volume entitled “Ex Post Economic Evaluation of Competition Policy: The EU Experience. More info on the publication here 

Paolo Buccirossi will intervene in the webinar by discussing the challenges posed by the ex-post evaluation of abuse of dominance cases.

To register at webinar here

EX POST ECONOMIC EVALUATION OF COMPETITION POLICY: THE EU EXPERIENCE

Lear’s partners contributed to a recently published book on the ex-post evaluation of competition policy in the EU. The book has been edited by Fabienne Ilzkovitz and Adriaan Dierx and collects studies that range from the ex post evaluation of specific policy interventions to the assessment of the broader impact of competition policy.
The volume enhances the assessment of the economic impact of this policy, which is essential for the good functioning of the internal market in the European Union. Continue reading EX POST ECONOMIC EVALUATION OF COMPETITION POLICY: THE EU EXPERIENCE →

CAPACITY BUILDING TO THE OFFICIALS OF THE ALBANIAN COMPETITION AUTHORITY

As part of the Technical Assistance project financed by the EBRD, Lear’s team is delivering online trainings to the officials of the Albanian Competition Authority to strengthen their skills and competencies on economic aspects of competition policy. In particular, the topics of the first set of trainings to be delivered in May 2020 are on:
Continue reading CAPACITY BUILDING TO THE OFFICIALS OF THE ALBANIAN COMPETITION AUTHORITY →

Our column on Vox “Tech-over: Mergers and merger policy in digital markets”

Lear together with Emilio Calvano looks at the M&A activity carried out by Amazon, Facebook, and Google between 2008 and 2018 (Argentesi et al., 2019b). Over this period, based on publicly available information, Google acquired 168 companies, Facebook 71 companies, and Amazon 60 companies. The question is whether the target companies would have grown to be viable competitors to the acquiring tech giants.
To read more on this article here

LEARTALK DIGITAL MARKETS – PRESENTATION OF THE STUDY

Lear economists discussed, together with practitioners from the private and public sector and academics, on the relevant economic features of digital markets and the challenges they present for merger control.

The presentation (in Italian) is available here