The paper provides a consistency analysis of the decisions taken by the Italian Competition Authority within the 1995-2003 period, concerning its control over mergers and acquisitions. An ample database was constructed using the tools of textual analysis. This data base was generated in a...

In this comprehensive review of ex-post merger studies price effects of horizontal transactions are evaluated. By combining and further analyzing the results of 52 retrospective studies on 82 mergers or merger-like transactions it can be shown that the industry alone is no strong indication for...

This paper provides a comprehensive discussion of the deterrence properties of a competition policy regime. On the basis of the economic theory of law enforcement we identify several factors that are likely to affect its degree of deterrence: 1) sanctions and damages; 2) financial and human...