Frontier Economics has submitted its response to the Competition and Markets Authority’s (CMA) review of merger remedies.
The CMA’s review is aimed at improving the pace, predictability, proportionality, and process ("4Ps") of the UK’s merger control regime.
In line with these objectives, our response outlines key recommendations for the CMA to enhance its approach to remedies, preserve merger benefits, and ensure efficient processes.
Alongside suggested changes – such as reconsidering the role of behavioural remedies in non-horizontal mergers and providing clarity on the frameworks used to assess rivalry-enhancing efficiencies – we also highlight effective aspects of the CMA’s current approach that would be worth preserving in future reforms. This includes the CMA’s practice of clearing mergers without remedies where the evidence meets the balance of probabilities threshold, rather than defaulting to remedies as a matter of caution.