CMA investigates publisher Penguin’s $2.2bn takeover of Simon & Schuster March 22, 2021 The competition watchdog is investigating if the $2.18bn takeover of Simon & Schuster by publisher Penguin Random House may hurt competition. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has until 19 May to decide whether to refer the merger to a more in-depth ‘phase two’ investigation, A spokesperson for Penguin Random House said: “We announced last November that Penguin Random [...]
Visa ‘facing US investigation’ over debit card practices March 19, 2021 Visa is said to be facing a regulatory investigation in the US over concerns it is engaging in anti-competitive practices in the debit card market. The US Department of Justice has been looking at whether Visa limited merchants’ ability to route transactions over card networks that are often less expensive, the Wall Street Journal reported. [...]
CMA orders Taylor Wimpey and Countryside to remove ground rents in rental contracts March 19, 2021 The Competition and Markets Authority said this morning it has instructed homebuilders Taylor Wimpey and Countryside Properties to remove certain contract terms that require leaseholders to pay ground rents which double every decade. The CMA said these terms could affect the property rights of the firms’ customers. Moreover, “as this increase is built into contracts, it means [...]
Google plan to block cookies ‘under scrutiny’ from US regulators March 18, 2021 Google’s plan to scrap web-tracking advertising tools known as cookies is said to have attracted scrutiny from US regulators amid concerns the move could harm smaller rivals. The search engine giant has unveiled proposals to block cookies in its Chrome browser in an effort to increase user privacy. But the plans have stirred up anger [...]
Watchdog slams rule-breaking influencers over ‘unacceptable’ social media ads March 18, 2021 The UK advertising watchdog has ramped up the pressure on social media influencers over their continued failure to mark posts as adverts. Under the current rules online stars are required to clearly state when their posts are sponsored or when a brand has provided them with free products. But a three-week monitoring exercise carried out [...]
Water bills: CMA settles long-running price controls dispute March 17, 2021 The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) today published its findings on the price controls for four water companies for 2020-2025. The group set a headline rate of return to investors of 3.2 per cent compared with 4.6 per cent in the previous price control period. It said the return is the minimum that is sufficient [...]
London remains Europe’s major global finance centre despite Brexit hit March 17, 2021 London has held on to the second spot in a respected international study of financial centres, despite the double whammy of Brexit and the Covid-19 pandemic. London sits behind only New York and remains Europe’s only major global financial centre, remaining a number of spots ahead of Frankfurt and Zurich. But Asian competitors Shanghai, Hong [...]
Apple hits back at App Store competition probe with UK jobs claim March 15, 2021 Apple today said its App Store supports 330,000 jobs in the UK as it hit back against a probe into claims it treats app developers unfairly. Earlier this month the Competition and Markets Authority opened an investigation into whether Apple imposes unfair or anti-competitive terms on developers after it received a number of complaints. The [...]
Tecent, Baidu and SoftBank fined in China for monopolistic behaviour in fintech crackdown March 12, 2021 China’s market regulator said today it has fined 12 companies $77,000 each for flouting anti-monopoly rules. Concerning ten deals in particular, companies including Tencent Holdings, Baidu Inc, Softbank and a ByteDance-backed firm, were fined for behaviour that caused market concentration, the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) said. The companies’ actions did not completely exclude [...]
DLT may not be the silver bullet, but it’s worth a shot March 10, 2021 Lord Holmes of Richmond MBE delivers the third installment of his five-piece analysis of the government's Financial Services Bill.