Antitrust In The Downturn

The credit crunch and economic downturn have brought about new challenges for competition law, for those subject to it and for those who administer it. In response to the liquidity crisis and associated deterioration of market conditions, antitrust enforcement authorities have demonstrated some flexibility in both the timing and substantive standards applied to the review of mergers and other collaborative activities in the financial industry. This flexibility, however, carries the additional challenges of ensuring consistency in enforcement and the implications of what may be more permissive legal precedents in relation to potentially anti-competitive practices and transactions.

These challenges – and how they play out for companies and financial institutions – are explored in this briefing.