政治学与国际关系论坛

 找回密码
 注册

QQ登录

只需一步,快速开始

扫一扫,访问微社区

查看: 476|回复: 0
打印 上一主题 下一主题

ANTI-TRUST IN CHINA

[复制链接]
跳转到指定楼层
1#
发表于 2009-5-7 13:34:46 | 只看该作者 回帖奖励 |倒序浏览 |阅读模式
China has given notice that it will not tolerate abuse of monopoly power, in industry if not in politics. Since it enacted an anti-trust law last August, the Ministry of Commerce has made three important rulings. In the latest, it imposed restrictions on the $1.6bn takeover by Japan's Mitsubishi Rayon of the UK's Lucite International, forcing the latter to sell half of its production of one polymer at cost. In March, it rejected Coca-Cola's planned $2.4bn takeover of Huiyuan, a Chinese juicemaker, in a ruling that surprised many lawyers. Before that, it had imposed restrictions on InBev's $52bn acquisition of Anheuser-Busch even though, like Mitsubishi/Lucite, it was a global transaction with only secondary implications for China.

The three rulings require careful attention. They demonstrate that the Ministry of Commerce is serious about implementing its anti-monopoly law. They also show that Beijing will not hesitate to intervene in largely extra-territorial deals. That means China has joined the US and the European Union as a global competition referee, providing M&A lawyers with a fresh set of problems to wrestle with.

China's rulings are too opaque. The latest – though an improvement on the first two – was delivered in less than two pages, a level of detail that falls far short of other competition authorities. At least it was based on the fact that Mitsubishi/Lucite would have a 64 per cent market share for methyl methacrylate, a polymer that ends up as acrylic glass. The Coke ruling, equally brief, did not convincingly identify competition concerns. Instead, it looked suspiciously like an attempt to defend a popular local brand after a vigorous internet campaign opposing Coke's encroachment. The InBev/Anheuser-Busch ruling also puzzled lawyers; it declared there were no competition concerns, but imposed restrictions on the merged entity's actions.

Beijing is right to enforce anti-monopoly laws. Moreover, its market is significantly large to justify it making rulings on mergers of a global nature, just as Brussels and Washington do. But China must be seen to be fair. In particular, it must not confuse anti-trust with industrial policy – a suspicion raised by the rejection of the Coke deal. If the perception takes hold that Beijing is dressing up protectionist sentiment in anti-trust robes, other governments will react in kind. That could provoke a nasty tit-for-tat trade war. From now on, China's anti-trust rulings should be more fully explained. If there are no genuine competition concerns, deals must be allowed to proceed unhindered.



分享到:  QQ好友和群QQ好友和群 QQ空间QQ空间 腾讯微博腾讯微博 腾讯朋友腾讯朋友 微信微信
收藏收藏 转播转播 分享分享 分享淘帖
您需要登录后才可以回帖 登录 | 注册

本版积分规则

Archiver|小黑屋|中国海外利益研究网|政治学与国际关系论坛 ( 京ICP备12023743号  

GMT+8, 2025-7-15 03:33 , Processed in 0.078125 second(s), 32 queries .

Powered by Discuz! X3.2

© 2001-2013 Comsenz Inc.

快速回复 返回顶部 返回列表