EU casts doubt over giant stock exchange merger
DEAL BETWEEN DEUTSCHE BOERSE AND NYSE MAY BE BLOCKED
Brussels (AFP) The merger of Deutsche Boerse and NYSE Euronext, which would create the world’s l a r ge s t marke t o p e r a - tor worth over $17 billion (Dh62.4 billion), looks seriously compromised just weeks from an EU competition decision.
With European anti-trust services setting conditions deemed unacceptable by executives, there is a growing chance that the tie-up putting the New York Stock Exchange under the same roof as the German market operator will fall apart.
A senior executive of NYSE Euronext — which also operates markets in Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels and Lisbon — said it would not make additional concessions to secure approval by the European Commission.
“We won’t go any further because that threatens the business logic of the deal,” NYSE Euronext deputy chief executive Dominique Cerutti told the French business daily La Tribune on Friday.
NYSE chief executive Duncan Niederauer had already acknowledged that it appeared the European Commission was set to reject the plans come a Febru- ary 9 deadline for its decision, almost one year after the deal was announced.
In a video message to employees, Niederauer said of the anticipated rejection: “If that’s true, I would have to say that’s a pretty disappointing conclusion.”
Unacceptable
A person familiar with the EU review said earlier in the week that the proposed merger as it stands was unacceptable.
EU competition authorities opened a probe into the deal in August over concerns that the merged company would control 90 per cent of the European derivatives market.
In November the companies proposed to separate some of their derivatives operations to allay EU concerns, but sources said the Commission was unsatisfied.
“It i s not certain t he Commission could accept” the merger in its current state, added the source.
The Commission wanted NYSE and Deutsche Boerse to sell off some of their derivatives businesses to allay competition concerns, which Cerutti said was a position “based on erroneous data”.