In the wake of the global economic crises as triggered by the
ongoing COVID-19 pandemic the Austrian Federal Competition
Authority ("AFCA") expects a rising
number of company takeovers for the coming months, although so far
the number of mergers has been lower than in earlier years. The
AFCA concludes that it would not be appropriate to relax merger
control for such "shutdown mergers", as this was
necessary to prevent damage to the structure of the Austrian market
and protect Austria's economic development in the long run.
At the same time, the AFCA highlights in a handout1 their view of macroeconomic effects
of market power and their assessment of acquisitions of financially
distressed companies. Generally, the AFCA concludes that by
preventing the accumulation of market power in the present crisis
Austrian merger control makes a positive contribution to
Austria's macroeconomic development, that merger control still
is to be conducted in accordance with objective
