Fishy Business: Multijurisdictional Treatment of a Horizontal Merger in Salmon Farming

Recent decentralisation of EU competition policy led observers to fear that competition authorities in different member states would implement rules differently. This case study shows that such concern is real. A 2006 merger was notified to competition authorities in multiple jurisdictions. Despite a unique consensus on economic modelling and facts, authorities reached different conclusions regarding the long-run effects of the merger. Most authorities cleared the merger unconditionally but one made clearance conditional on divestitures. Behind the different treatment lie either different objectives or different theories of competitive harm. Both explanations are troubling since the authorities could have used the European Commission as a coordinating device.