In a blog post published March 20, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) cautioned against anticompetitive information sharing in the lead-up to closing a transaction.
The FTC has long held that information sharing between competitors can harm competition in violation of the antitrust laws. This is true even when two companies are in the process of merging. The FTC blog post offers a clear reminder that the obligation to act as competitors does not end until the transaction has actually closed. Even if the applicable waiting period under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act has expired, premerger information exchanges can raise antitrust risks under Section 1 of the Sherman Act. Until consummation, the parties are separate entities and generally should not share competitively sensitive information.
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