As this year’s roundtable of enforcers demonstrated, big business is probably antitrust enforcers’ greatest fear. Spring in Washington means Cherry blossoms and antitrust. And last week, 3,700 antitrust lawyers and government...more
Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act was originally thought of as "force for securing decency on the Internet," as the late Judge Robert A. Katzmann of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit explained in a...more
The DOJ continued its transformation of long-standing antitrust policy on February 3rd, withdrawing a slate of long-standing antitrust policy statements addressing healthcare markets and providers. The three guidance...more
Over the past year, the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) has increasingly been hot on the heels of suspected anti-competitive labor violations. To date, the DOJ has brought a few actions against employers across industries...more
It used to be privacy was largely the domain of constitutional law and patient health care law: the Fourth Amendment, and then the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)....more
The FTC has announced penalties in two separate enforcement actions totaling almost $2 million for alleged violations of the HSR Act. The matters: U.S. v. Clarence L. Werner c/o Werner Enterprises, Inc.; and U.S. v. Biglari...more
2021 will be remembered in antitrust law. Not since the 1970s has there been so much chatter over the fundamental purposes of antitrust policy, or such potential for actual sea change.
Originally published in Law360 -...more
1/5/2022
/ Acquisition Agreements ,
Anti-Competitive ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Competition ,
Consent Decrees ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Merger Agreements ,
Merger Controls ,
Merger Reviews ,
Regulatory Agenda ,
Sherman Act ,
Vertical Mergers ,
Warning Letters
With a rash of changes since Chair Lina Khan took command, the Federal Trade Commission is proving the maxim that the only certainty is uncertainty.
Its new policy of issuing warning letters to deals that have...more
As the saying goes, “the only thing for certain, is nothing is certain.” With a rash of changes since Chairperson Lina Kahn took command, the FTC is certainly proving that maxim true. Seeking to transform the historically...more
Online platforms that allow users to post content face a constant choice: to remove or to not remove, to police or not to police.
Shakespearean allusions aside, platforms generally want user engagement — to reach as many...more
8/13/2021
/ Anti-Competitive ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Civil Liability ,
Communications Decency Act ,
Online Platforms ,
PACT Act ,
Section 230 ,
Social Media ,
User-Generated Content ,
Website Owner Liability ,
Websites
The Sherman Act was passed in 1890. The Clayton Act in 1914. And they have hardly changed since. Last month, Senator Amy Klobuchar, the new chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition...more
On September 23, 2020, the New York Supreme Court dismissed Attorney General Letitia James’ lawsuit against Quality King Distributors alleging that the wholesaler unlawfully increased the price of its Lysol products. In a...more
9/29/2020
/ Antitrust Provisions ,
Antitrust Violations ,
Bargaining Power ,
Chain of Distribution ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Goods or Services ,
NY Supreme Court ,
Price Gouging ,
Price Inflation ,
State Attorneys General ,
Supply and Demand ,
Supply Chain ,
Unfair or Deceptive Trade Practices
During the current COVID emergency, every state that has price gouging laws on its books has activated them. States without official statutes are regulating prices by executive order or existing consumer protection and unfair...more
Primary HSR filing threshold will be raised to $84.4 million -
The Federal Trade Commission has announced revisions to HSR Act and Clayton Act Section 8 thresholds, which are indexed annually to account for inflation. As...more
1/30/2018
/ Acquisitions ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Filing Fees ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Mergers ,
Premerger Notifications ,
Reporting Requirements ,
The Clayton Act ,
Threshold Requirements
In a move that may not have stood up under the new administration, the U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division settled a matter during the last days of the Obama Administration which involved allegations of...more
2/15/2017
/ Acquisition Agreements ,
Antitrust Division ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Beneficial Owner ,
Competition ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Duke Energy ,
Enforcement Actions ,
FERC ,
Gun-Jumping ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Premerger Notifications ,
Tolling Agreement ,
Waiting Periods
Primary HSR filing threshold will be raised to $80.8 million -
The Federal Trade Commission has announced revisions to HSR Act and Clayton Act Section 8 thresholds, which are indexed annually to account for inflation. As...more
The Federal Trade Commission's Premerger Notification Office has expanded the Hart-Scott-Rodino (HSR) reporting requirements for certain leveraged buyouts. M&A practitioners generally are familiar with the HSR premerger...more
10/25/2016
/ Acquisition Agreements ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Leveraged Buyout ,
Merger Agreements ,
Pre-Merger Filing Requirements ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Size of Transaction Test
A Federal Appeals Court has sided with the FTC and preliminarily blocked the proposed merger of the largest hospitals in the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania area, and Penn State Hershey Medical Center and PinnacleHealth System. The...more
In 1995, the Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Justice first issued the Antitrust Guidelines for the Licensing of Intellectual Property. They represent the antitrust enforcement policy of the agencies with...more
The Supreme Court once again showed that, when it comes to the antitrust laws, the consumer is king. In Oneok, Inc. v. Learjet, the Court was asked to decide where state antitrust laws end and federal regulation begins. The...more
This year's 63rd ABA Section of Antitrust Law Spring Meeting featured extensive remarks from antitrust regulators forewarning of more vigorous antitrust enforcement in 2015. The Proskauer antitrust team was on the ground and...more
January is a good time to take stock of compliance programs and set aside dated opinions and guidance to avoid relying on old rules, and antitrust is no exception to that. Because the FTC announces revisions to HSR Act and...more
On November 7, 2014, the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice ("DOJ") announced that it had imposed a civil penalty of $3.8M and disgorgement of $1.15M in profits on Flakeboard America Limited (and its parent...more
11/19/2014
/ Antitrust Provisions ,
Civil Monetary Penalty ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Disgorgement ,
Due Diligence ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Flakeboard America ,
Gun-Jumping ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Settlement ,
Sherman Act ,
SierraPine ,
Waiting Periods