The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) continues to play an increasingly active role in reviewing and assessing inbound investment transactions for U.S. national security risks. In this alert, we...more
On February 28, 2024, President Biden issued an Executive Order (EO) entitled, “Preventing Access to Americans’ Bulk Sensitive Personal Data and United States Government-Related Data by Countries of Concern,” outlining a new...more
3/7/2024
/ Biden Administration ,
Cross-Border Transactions ,
Data Privacy ,
Data Protection ,
Data Security ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Executive Orders ,
National Security ,
Personal Data ,
Personally Identifiable Information ,
Privacy Laws
After over a year of anticipation, on August 9, 2023, President Biden issued an Executive Order (“EO”) outlining a new regulatory regime for outbound investments from the United States. The EO targets certain U.S. investments...more
8/21/2023
/ Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPRM) ,
Biden Administration ,
China ,
Executive Orders ,
Foreign Investment ,
Investment ,
National Security ,
New Rules ,
Notice Requirements ,
Outbound Transactions ,
Popular ,
Public Comment ,
Regulatory Agenda ,
Technology Sector ,
U.S. Commerce Department ,
U.S. Treasury
Last week, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) released its 2022 Annual Report to Congress. CFIUS reported a record 440 filings in 2022. Although this reflects only a small increase from the 436...more
On Friday, the Treasury Department’s Office of Investment Security proposed expanding the authority of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to block real estate transactions involving foreign...more
The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) of the U.S. Department of Commerce announced this past week that it was adding more than three dozen companies to the Entity List effective immediately. This is the second round of...more
The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) (collectively, “Agencies”) released the final version of the Vertical Merger Guidelines (“Vertical Guidelines”) on June 30, 2020. The new Vertical...more
Welcome to the 2019 Shearman & Sterling Antitrust Annual Report.
Our seventh edition focuses on the contrasting use by regulators of antitrust laws with respect to the FANGs, and how antitrust is being enforced in the U.S....more
7/24/2019
/ Acquisitions ,
Antitrust Investigations ,
Antitrust Litigation ,
Competition ,
Competition Authorities ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Criminal Liability ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Digital Marketplace ,
Digital Media ,
Enforcement Actions ,
EU ,
Extraterritoriality Rules ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
FinTech ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Leniency Programs ,
Merger Controls ,
Mergers ,
No-Poaching ,
Recruitment Policies ,
State Aid ,
Trump Administration ,
UK Brexit
The European Commission (EC) and other national competition authorities (NCAs) have traditionally shied away from investigating allegations of excessive pricing and appearing as price regulators. Commissioner Vestager warned...more
4/26/2018
/ Abuse of Dominance ,
Actavis Inc. ,
Antitrust Investigations ,
Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ,
EU ,
Excessive Pricing ,
Hoffman LaRoche ,
Merck ,
Pay-For-Delay ,
Pfizer ,
Pharmaceutical Industry ,
Prescription Drugs ,
Pricing ,
Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) ,
UK ,
UK Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT)
In perhaps the most hotly anticipated judgment in the European competition law world this year, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) handed down its landmark ruling on September 6, 2017 in Intel’s appeal against...more
4/26/2018
/ Abuse of Dominance ,
Anti-Competitive ,
Antitrust Litigation ,
Appeals ,
Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) ,
EU ,
European Commission ,
Intel ,
Rebates ,
Rebuttable Presumptions ,
Rules of Civil Procedure
Large online platforms such as Amazon, Facebook and Google have a strong presence in Europe. Although general competition law principles apply to them, cases concerning online platforms give rise to a lot of novel questions...more
4/24/2018
/ Abuse of Dominance ,
AirBnB ,
Amazon ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Competition Authorities ,
EU ,
Facebook ,
Google ,
Online Platforms ,
Social Networks ,
Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU)
On December 9, 2016, the PRC National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) handed down its decision against medical device company Medtronic for having concluded and implemented a vertical monopoly agreement by...more
The growth of e-commerce and the resulting increase in price transparency and price competition have a significant impact on companies’ distribution strategies and consumer behavior. While the emergence of e-commerce has the...more
4/20/2018
/ Amazon ,
Antitrust Investigations ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Coty ,
E-Commerce ,
EU ,
Internet Retailers ,
Manufacturers ,
Product Pricing ,
Retailers ,
Sales & Distribution Agreements ,
Supply Chain ,
Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU)
It has been a year since Article 50 was triggered on March 29, 2017, and if no extension is given, the U.K. will leave the European Union (EU) on March 29, 2019. This means that negotiations are now at the half-way point, but...more
4/18/2018
/ Article 50 Treaty of the EU ,
Cross-Border Transactions ,
EFTA ,
EU ,
European Economic Area (EEA) ,
Free Trade Agreements ,
Member State ,
Merger Agreements ,
Mergers ,
State Aid ,
UK ,
UK Brexit ,
UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) ,
WTO
Divining trends in antitrust enforcement in a given presidential administration can take some time. Many commentators didn’t notice material changes in antitrust enforcement in the Obama administration – at least in merger...more
Algorithms and the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) have become commonplace in a vast number of markets, and this has drawn the attention not only of competition law academics and practitioners, but also of competition...more
While structural remedies remain the primary remedy of choice, and virtually the only option in the case of horizontal mergers, under the Obama Administration and with respect to vertical mergers, the agencies increasingly...more
The EU and U.S. competition authorities have been and remain active in enforcing gun-jumping cases, while in recent years other competition authorities across the world, including in China, have also become increasingly...more
4/12/2018
/ Acquisitions ,
Antitrust Violations ,
China ,
Competition ,
Competition Authorities ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
EU ,
European Commission ,
Gun-Jumping ,
Hart-Scott-Rodino Act ,
Japan ,
Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) ,
Mergers ,
MOFCOM
In China, where foreign investments used to be subject to a case-by-case evaluation, the screening process for acquisitions of local businesses by foreign investors is being simplified and becoming more industry-focused. This...more
4/12/2018
/ CFIUS ,
China ,
Cross-Border Transactions ,
EU ,
European Commission ,
Foreign Acquisitions ,
Foreign Investment ,
Germany ,
Italy ,
Merger Controls ,
Mergers ,
MOFCOM ,
National Security Review Proceedings ,
UK
Is this perception well-founded? And does it represent a new policy trend towards ‘social justice’ objectives or simply a continuation of a policy driver that has underpinned EU competition enforcement for some time?...more
4/11/2018
/ Agricultural Sector ,
Anti-Competitive ,
Antitrust Provisions ,
Cartels ,
Competition ,
EU ,
European Commission ,
International Tax Issues ,
Member State ,
Mergers ,
Multinationals ,
R&D ,
State Aid ,
Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) ,
Unfair or Deceptive Trade Practices