What can merger retrospectives tell us?An assessment of European mergers

Franco Mariuzzo, Peter Ormosi and Richard Havell
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Franco Mariuzzo: Centre for Competition Policy and School of Economics, University of East Anglia
Peter Ormosi: Centre for Competition Policy and Norwich Business School, University of East Anglia
Richard Havell: Charles River Associates

No 2016-04, Working Paper series, University of East Anglia, Centre for Competition Policy (CCP) from Centre for Competition Policy, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK.

Abstract: In this review of retrospective European merger studies we provide a discussion of the price effect of analysed mergers and examine whether the antitrust agency made the right decisions. We find that remedied mergers, on average, were not followed by a price-increase, suggesting that, in our sample, merger interventions were effective at eliminating problems. High market concentration was more likely to lead to higher post-merger prices, although remedies were able to reduce post-merger price-increases, even in concentrated markets. We look at a number of reasons why prices may increase post-merger and find little evidence of genuine agency errors.

Keywords: mergers; merger retrospectives; ex-post evaluation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K21 L11 L40 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016-05-13
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:uea:ueaccp:2016_04

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