Ryuu96 said:
Eh...FTC may sue to block and while Microsoft can beat them easily in court, it's the CMA who is the problem here, if CMA blocks the deal, then Microsoft has to appeal to CAT who ultimately throw the decision back to CMA who can then just block the deal again, the CMA has very little legal oversight and very rarely loses. By comparison to the FTC, who don't actually approve anything, they just let it pass, nor do they actually block anything, they get the courts to block deals, the CMA doesn't do either of those things, it's CMA who approves or blocks things without any court oversight, that's at least my understanding from what I've read. So, we need to be careful that if FTC sues to block it doesn't encourage CMA to block because if it does then the deal is likely dead. I think it's still more likely to go through than not, but I doubt Microsoft wanted to make concessions this extreme, a 10-year guarantee to a competitor is an extreme concession, Hoeg spoke on this that he thinks it's the absolute maximum that Microsoft is willing to offer and they're doing so in the hope that they get the issue out of the way. Plus, if FTC does sue to block, which is a strong possibility regardless of the reasoning as they've sued to block a lot of deals lately and are very eager to look like they're cracking down on big tech, it would very likely mean that Microsoft has to renegotiate the acquisition with ABK as the court case will likely delay the closure date beyond July 2023. If a renegotiation does happen, it means that the acquisition has to be redone, if ABK still desires to be acquired, and that will almost certainly lead to ABK asking for an even higher sale price than $68bn and Microsoft used that cash when interest was at shit levels so who knows how much higher than $68bn they're willing to go now that interest is back at decent levels. There could be two angles at play from the FTC here even if their arguments don't make any sense.
Either option would make FTC look like they won against big tech even if they didn't technically win in a court of law, Lol. I'm at about 60% that the deal passes, it will likely still pass, but Microsoft definitely didn't expect this level of scrutiny from regulators, hence why Brad Smith is openly complaining a little too. However! FTC could just be formulating a complaint/lawsuit to ask for concessions as that is the usual process, that would still make them look like they had a win against big tech, they can frame it as them strong arming Microsoft into concessions, this is more about politics lately than actual legally sound market arguments. If FTC is only asking for concessions, then they'll pass as I doubt CMA will solo Microsoft. |
I believe MS will clear the CMA because at the end of the day, what the CMA is looking at is something MS can easily provide whatever concessions they want. This is why I do not believe the CMA poses any real problem for MS. Its way to concerned about COD which is something MS can easily provide them with whatever concessions they want towards that IP. It really does not matter for MS because COD will be like Minecraft and it will just continue to print money.
The FTC really have nothing that they can really block this deal over. There is nothing that ABK gives MS that upsets the game market and if COD is still the thing they throw on the pile, those are just easy concessions MS is more than willing to make.
From the moves I have seen MS make, they are 100% on GP. They do not care about the Console war, they are not concerned about the PC space like the regulators believe. GP just do not have enough users to say their is a monopoly so the regulators cannot really concentrate on that service. ABK property outside of COD have plenti of competition. Most of Sony arguments can be contested based on Sony own tactics and huge marketshare. MS is really looking pretty strong if you ask me and it would definitely need to be some very underhanded stuff to go on to stop this purchase. Not saying that it cannot happen but from what I see so far, things look like smooth sailing.
I would not be surprised that MS did not sandbag getting their games out this year because they can show weakness. Think about if MS had a Steller year with big IP dropping on time, their case would be harder to represent. Coming short on GP subs is a win. Coming up short on game sells is a win, I am telling you MS has been playing this game and basically leading the results into their favor every since they went for this deal.
