Authors: Steven Cernak and Luis Blanquez As we explained in a prior post, the new draft merger Guidelines issued recently by the FTC and DOJ cite to several older court opinions that may be unfamiliar to antitrust practitioners who have been focused for decades exclusively on earlier versions of the…
Authors: Steven Cernak and Luis Blanquez As we explained in a prior post, the new draft merger Guidelines issued recently by the FTC and DOJ cite to several older court opinions that might not be familiar to antitrust practitioners who have been focused for decades exclusively on earlier versions of…
Authors: Steven Cernak and Luis Blanquez On July 19, 2023, the FTC and DOJ Antitrust Division issued the draft of their long-anticipated Merger Guidelines. Like prior iterations, these Guidelines are meant to explain to potential merging parties how the agencies will evaluate their proposed transactions. Earlier versions included input from…
Authors: Steven Cernak and Aaron Gott Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the Federal Trade Commission and allowed Axon Enterprise to raise certain constitutional objections to FTC processes in federal court before going through the FTC’s internal administrative proceedings. That decision teed up an “existential” threat to the…
Author: Jarod Bona Some antitrust questions are easy: Is naked price-fixing among competitors a Sherman Act violation? Yes, of course it is. Indeed, it is a per se antitrust violation. But there is one issue that is not only a common occurrence but also a source of great controversy among antitrust…
Author: Jarod Bona As an antitrust attorney, over time you see the same major cases cited again and again. It is only natural that you develop favorites. Here at The Antitrust Attorney Blog, we, from time-to-time, highlight some of the “Classic Antitrust Cases” that we love, that we hate, or…
Author: Steven J. Cernak[1] On June 21, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed lower court decisions and held that certain NCAA restrictions on educational benefits for student-athletes violated Sherman Act Section 1. The unanimous opinion was a clear win for the plaintiff class and almost certainly will lead to big…
Author: Jarod Bona The US Supreme Court in AMG Capital Management, LLC v. Federal Trade Commission ends, at least for now, the FTC’s habit of seeking monetary damages in court as part of requests for equitable relief. The decision wasn’t controversial at the Supreme Court, as it was unanimous, with…
Author: Jarod Bona When you think about Sherman Act Section 1 antitrust cases (the ones involving conspiracies), you usually consider the question—often framed at the motion to dismiss stage as a Twombly inquiry—whether the defendants actually engaged in an antitrust conspiracy. But, sometimes, the question is whether the defendants are, in…
Author: Jarod Bona An amicus curiae brief is filed by a non-party—usually in an appellate court like the US Supreme Court—that seeks to educate the court by offering facts, analysis, or at least a perspective that the party briefing doesn’t present. The term amicus curiae means “friend of the court,” and…