0  – The number of new merger prohibition decisions

1  – The number of appeals to the Competition Appeals Tribunal

3  – The number of Phase 2 decisions – all clearances

4  – The number of Phase 1 cases that investigated coordination between firms

5   –  The number of rail franchise cases examined

6   –  The percentage of cases in which merger efficiencies or customer benefits were examined in some detail

13  –  The number of cases opened in August, the peak month of the year for new cases

16  –  The percentage of cases found not to qualify for investigation under the tests for jurisdiction

18  – The percentage of qualifying cases found to result in a substantial lessening of competition at Phase 1

19  – The percentage of cases in which parties argued that one of the businesses involved would exit if the merger did not proceed

20  – The percentage of cases qualifying for investigation under the turnover test

21  – The number of Phase 1 cases involving ‘vertical’ theories of harm

33 – The number of opened Phase 1 cases being investigated at the peak month-end of the year – October

45  – The percentage of cases involving completed deals

50  – The percentage of cases found to harm competition that were referred for Phase 2 investigation

53  – The percentage of cases in which one or more competitors to the merging parties expressed concerns about the deal

54  – The percentage of cases that investigated more than one theory of harm to competition

59 – The percentage of cases in which one or more customers of the parties expressed concerns about the deal

60  – The smallest share of supply for the parties to those deals found to harm competition

78  – The number of pages in the longest Phase 1 decision

82  –  The number of Phase 1 decisions announced

90  – The highest percentage share of supply of one of the parties to a merger that was cleared at Phase 1

6,500,000  – The size (in pounds) of the largest market deemed too small to justify a Phase 2 investigation (under the de minimis criteria)

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Note: Numbers refer to those OFT, CC and CMA cases for which the decisions were announced during 2014 and for which relevant details were published as at 31/12/14.

© Adrian Payne 2015