Biden Administration Calls for Whole-of-Government Approach to More Vigorous Antitrust Enforcement
Latest from Antitrust & Competition Blog
Poaching: The Biden Executive Order and Employment Restrictions in Europe
No-poach and wage-fixing agreements – arrangements between companies seeking to prevent or limit the hiring of each other’s employees, or to suppress the wages and/or benefits of their respective current employees are not only currently under the spotlight in the US, but have also been subject to scrutiny by antitrust authorities in the European Union (EU), albeit to a more limited degree. These antitrust infringement decisions have mostly been taken by EU Member State national…
The UK Competition and Markets Authority’s Vertical Agreement Proposals – Still Anchored to the EU?
Despite the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, the EU Vertical Agreement Block Exemption Regulation (retained VABER) continues to offer a safe harbor with respect to potentially anti-competitive vertical or supply agreements with an effect on trade within the UK. In this Alert, Steptoe’s EU Competition Team analyses the UK Competition and Market Authority’s recently issued consultation on its proposals for a UK Vertical Agreements Block Exemption Order that will replace the retained VABER.
Any interested…
Antitrust Enforcement in the Biden Administration: What We Know from the First 100 Days
Steptoe’s Antitrust practice hosted a complimentary webinar on antitrust enforcement in the Biden administration. Click here to access the recording.
During the webinar, the team compared and contrasted enforcement priorities and actions from the Trump administration with the positions the Biden administration might take that are informed by campaign proposals and actions so far. The discussion included potential legislation coming out of Congress that will focus on antitrust and competition as well as changes…
Supreme Court: FTC May Not Seek Restitution Directly in Federal Court
As we predicted in Steptoe’s client webinar last week on “Antitrust Enforcement in the Biden Administration – What We Know from The First 100 Days,” on April 22, 2021 the US Supreme Court put an end to the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) longstanding practice under § 13(b) of the FTC Act of seeking disgorgement or restitution orders in cases brought by the agency in federal courts.…
Attack of the Killer Acquisitions
A ‘killer acquisition’ is an acquisition of a potential rival whilst they are still in the early stages of their development, whose turnover is small or zero, in order to eliminate them as a possible source of future competition. Such acquisitions often fly under the radar of EU and national merger regimes which are usually only engaged when the turn-over of a target exceeds a certain threshold. They tend to be a particular problem in…
Home-Coming of Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolate Bars (Part 1)
On March 2, 2021, the UK signed a trade partnership agreement with Ghana. Recently, Cadbury, which is wholly owned by Mondelez, has announced that it is moving some production of its iconic Dairy Milk chocolate bars from Germany to the UK. This note, which is in two parts, considers the connection between the trade partnership agreement between the UK and Ghana and the relocation of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk chocolate production to the UK from the…
EU/UK Trade Post-Brexit: Rules of Origin and Their Impact on Competition Law
The following note highlights certain barriers to free trade flows between the UK and the EU that have arisen in the post-Brexit era, with particular reference to rules of origin and origin procedures. It assesses the consequences these new rules will have in determining market power, influencing supply chain practices, and the application of UK and EU competition law in the future.…
A Busy Month for DOJ on No-Poach/Wage-Fixing Enforcement Front
This month has so far seen two significant actions taken by the Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division (Antitrust Division) on wage-fixing and no-poach litigation and enforcement matters, which has shed additional light in an enforcement area that has needed it. Over the last few weeks, the Antitrust Division both served up its first indictment in a criminal wage-fixing case, and filed an amicus brief in a “no-poach” case to clarify its view of how…
US Procurement Collusion Strike Force Issues Its First Indictment
A little over a year after its creation the Procurement Collusion Strike Force has announced its first public indictments. The Strike Force was created to focus on rooting out collusion and related schemes aimed at impeding competition in public contracting. As DOJ made clear when the Strike Force was created, DOJ views price-fixing in government contracting as a particularly harmful since it directly harms U.S. taxpayers. The Strike Force includes prosecutors from both the DOJ…