Here are some of the developments in antitrust news this past week that we found interesting and are following.

U.S. sues to stop western hospital system from buying clinics.  U.S. antitrust enforcers have filed a complaint aimed at stopping a big hospital system in the western United States from buying a series of clinics.  The lawsuit is aimed at stopping Sanford Health, which has more than 40 hospitals and 250 clinics, from buying Mid Dakota Clinic, which has eight facilities primarily in Bismarck, North Dakota, the Federal Trade Commission said.  The FTC, which sued along with the North Dakota attorney general’s office, said that the merger would sharply reduce competition to provide a broad range of medical services in Bismarck and the surrounding area.

U.S. to seek to block DraftKings, FanDuel fantasy sports merger.  The U.S. Federal Trade Commission said it will seek to stop the merger of DraftKings and FanDuel, because the combined company would control more than 90 percent of the U.S. market for paid daily fantasy sports contests.  The FTC, along with the attorneys general of California and the District of Columbia, will file a complaint in federal district court seeking a preliminary injunction to block the deal, the antitrust regulator said.

Judge Blocks Merger of Nuclear-Waste Disposal Companies.  A federal judge in Delaware has blocked a Utah-based nuclear waste disposal company from buying a Texas-based competitor.  The judge on Wednesday ruled in favor of the U.S. Justice Department in an antitrust lawsuit aimed at blocking Salt Lake City-based EnergySolutions’ planned $367 million acquisition of rival Waste Control Specialists, based in Dallas.

Bayer CEO says talks with EU over Monsanto deal constructive.  Bayer’s chief executive said talks with the EU Commission over the antitrust scrutiny of the German drugmaker’s planned takeover of U.S. seeds maker Monsanto were “very good and constructive,” confirming a target to wrap up the deal by year-end.  Bayer still expects to be able to file for regulatory approval in Europe by the end of June, and CEO Werner Baumann reiterated that EU regulators would likely launch an in-depth analysis of the transaction, which will create the world’s largest supplier in the combined seeds and crop chemicals market.

Here are some of the developments in antitrust news this past week that we found interesting and are following.

EU antitrust regulators to investigate $38 billion Qualcomm, NXP deal.  EU antitrust authorities opened an investigation on Friday into Qualcomm’s $38-billion bid for NXP Semiconductors, ratcheting up pressure on the U.S. smartphone chipmaker to offer concessions to address their concerns.  Qualcomm, which supplies chips to Android smartphone makers and Apple, is set to become the leading supplier to the fast growing automotive chip market following the deal, the largest-ever in the semiconductor industry.  The European Commission listed a raft of concerns about the combined company’s ability and incentives to squeeze out rivals and jack up prices.

Lawsuit in U.S. accuses 12 big banks of credit default swap collusion.  A small trading exchange on Thursday filed an antitrust lawsuit accusing Bank of America Corp , Citigroup Inc, JPMorgan Chase & Co and nine other banks of conspiring to shut it out of the $9.9 trillion credit default swap market.  Tera Group Inc. accused the banks of coordinating a boycott of its seven-year-old TeraExchange platform by refusing both to send it any CDS transactions, and to clear and settle any CDS trades that customers wanted to handle there.  It also said the banks used their 95 percent market share to require that trading follow a protocol known as “request for quote,” which Tera described as opaque and inefficient.

French Drugmaker Servier Challenges 331 Million Euro EU Antitrust Fine.  French drugmaker Servier urged an EU court on Tuesday to slash a 331 million euro antitrust fine, saying regulators had committed multiple errors when they ruled against the company’s pay-for-delay deals with generic rivals three years ago.  Such deals, a typical business practice in the industry, are frowned upon by competition authorities on both sides of the Atlantic, who say they block the entry of cheaper generic medicines into the market as governments grapple with rising healthcare costs.

Johnson & Johnson expects to complete of Actelion offer on June 16.  Johnson & Johnson said Friday’s approval of its proposed acquisition of Swiss biotech company Actelion by the European Commission meant all regulatory approvals required to complete the $30 billion deal have been received.  The U.S. company said it expects settlement of the all-cash public tender offer by its Swiss subsidiary, Janssen Holding, on June 16.  EU antitrust regulators approved on Friday Johnson & Johnson’s planned purchase of Actelion subject to conditions intended to ensure clinical development of insomnia drugs were unaffected.

Here are some of the developments in antitrust news this past week that we found interesting and are following.

Exclusive: Google faces hefty EU fine in shopping case by August – sources.  EU antitrust regulators aim to slap a hefty fine on Alphabet unit Google over its shopping service before the summer break in August, two people familiar with the matter said, setting the stage for two other cases involving the U.S. company.  The European Commission’s decision will come after a seven-year investigation into the world’s most popular internet search engine triggered by scores of complaints from both U.S. and European rivals.  The EU competition authority accused Google in April 2015 of distorting internet search results to favor its shopping service, harming both rivals and consumers.

Qualcomm hits at FTC over ‘deficient’ antitrust suit.  The back and forth goes on in the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s antitrust suit against Qualcomm, the world’s largest maker of mobile chips.  Late Friday night, Qualcomm fired the latest salvo in the case, filing documents in which it says, for a second time, that the FTC’s suit should be dismissed because it doesn’t back up the agency’s claims that Qualcomm’s practices hampered competition.

Dollar Express sues Dollar Tree for driving it out of business.  U.S. discount retailer Dollar Express has filed a lawsuit accusing rival Family Dollar and its parent company Dollar Tree Inc of driving it out of business, the third government-required divestiture to fail in recent years.  Dollar Express was formed in 2015 when private equity group Sycamore Partners II LP bought some 330 stores in 35 states from Family Dollar and Dollar Tree.  Family Dollar had to sell the stores in order to win antitrust approval to merge with Dollar Tree.  In the lawsuit filed Thursday, Dollar Express accuses Dollar Tree of using confidential information to open new shops near the divested stores to drive them out of business.

EU regulators say Qualcomm has not offered concessions in NXP bid.  U.S. smartphone chipmaker Qualcomm has not offered any concessions so far in its $38-billion bid for NXP Semiconductors, EU antitrust regulators said on Friday, increasing the risk of a lengthy investigation into the deal.  Qualcomm, which supplies chips to Android smartphone makers and Apple, had until June 1 to propose concessions to allay possible competition concerns over the biggest-ever deal in the semiconductor industry.

Here are some of the developments in antitrust news this past week that we found interesting and are following.

EU to Conclude Google Antitrust Cases in Next Few Months.  EU antitrust regulators will rule in the “next few months” whether Alphabet’s Google abused its dominance of internet searches and other areas, according to a senior European Commission official, an outcome that could lead to a hefty fine.  The world’s most popular internet search engine has been in the Commission’s crosshairs since 2010 over the promotion of its own shopping service in internet searches at the expense of the services of rivals.

Judge Tosses Suit Against NFL Over Cheerleader Wages.  A lawsuit accusing the NFL and team owners of conspiring to suppress wages for cheerleaders lacks evidence to support that claim, a federal judge said.  U.S. District Judge William Alsup dismissed the lawsuit by a former San Francisco 49ers cheerleader. The lawsuit sought class action status on behalf of all NFL cheerleaders.

EU Antitrust Regulators to Scrutinize Syndicated Loans.  European Union antitrust regulators are to put major financial services firms under the microscope by examining the impact of syndicated loans on credit markets.  “The fact that the (European) Commission commissions a study in a specific market does not in any way imply that there is anti-competitive behavior taking place or that the Commission would open an investigation into that market,” spokesman Ricardo Cardoso said in an email.  In Europe, bank loans traditionally accounted for around 70 percent of lending to companies and other borrowers.  This contrasts with the United States where the credit markets have made up some 70-80 percent of where companies borrow.

Gazprom Executive to Meet EU Antitrust Chief, May Have to Improve Concessions.  Gazprom’s deputy chief executive will meet EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager on Monday who may ask the Russian gas giant to improve its concessions aimed at ending a six-year-long investigation, a source close to the matter said on Sunday.  State-controlled Gazprom, which supplies a third of the EU’s gas, offered in March to scrap business practices and a pricing policy seen by the European Commission as anti-competitive in a bid to stave off a possible fine.

Here are some of the developments in antitrust news this past week that we found interesting and are following.

EU Fines Facebook 110 mln euros over WhatsApp deal.  European Union antitrust regulators fined Facebook 110 million euros ($122 million) on Thursday for giving misleading information during a vetting of its deal to acquire messaging service WhatsApp in 2014.  Calling it a “proportionate and deterrent fine,” the European Commission, which acts as the EU’s competition watchdog, said Facebook had said it could not automatically match user accounts on its namesake platform and WhatsApp, but two years later launched a service that did exactly that.

Tronc in Talks with Wrapports to Acquire Chicago Sun-Times.  Two longtime newspaper rivals in the once highly competitive Chicago market may end with the acquisition of the Chicago Sun-Times by the owner of the Chicago Tribune, which has grabbed the attention of the U.S. Justice Department Monday.  Chicago-based Wrapports LLC announced in a statement it has agreed to enter into discussions with Tronc Inc., owner of several major newspapers, after failing to interest other media companies in acquiring the Sun-Times.

HSBC Settles Bondholders’ Claims of Libor Manipulation.  HSBC Holdings Plc has settled claims by a group of U.S. bondholders that it conspired with rivals to rig the Libor benchmark interest rate, according to a New York court filing by the bondholders’ attorneys.  The filing did not disclose the terms of the settlement, which it said must be approved by U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald in Manhattan federal court.

Antitrust: Commission Opens Formal Investigation into Aspen Pharma’s Pricing Practices for Cancer Medicines.  The European Commission has opened a formal investigation into concerns that Aspen Pharma has engaged in excessive pricing concerning five life-saving cancer medicines.  The Commission will investigate whether Aspen has abused a dominant market position in breach of EU antitrust rules.

Merck, Upsher-Smith to Pay $60 mln in ‘Pay-for-Delay’ Drug Case.  Merck & Co Inc and Upsher-Smith Laboratories Inc. have agreed to pay $60.2 million to resolve a lawsuit that said they entered into a deal to unlawfully delay the availability of generic versions of potassium supplement K-Dur.  The settlement, disclosed in papers filed in federal court in Newark, came in a class action filed in 2001 arising out of a settlement in patent litigation between Upsher-Smith and Schering-Plough Corp, now owned by Merck.  That patent deal, plaintiffs in the antitrust class action said, was an example of a “pay-for-delay” settlement, in which brand-name drug makers pay generic companies to keep their products off the market for a longer period.