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Japan: Antitrust watchdog to review 2 oil mergers together

By  |  September 1, 2016

Japan’s competition authority will examine two merger plans involving domestic oil companies as a package given their potential to create a virtual duopoly in the market for refined products.

Wednesday’s merger agreement between JX Holdings and TonenGeneral Sekiyu shifts the attention over that deal to the Japan Fair Trade Commission, which had intended to consider it in relation to a proposed tie-up between Idemitsu Kosan and Showa Shell Sekiyu.

The latter deal faces opposition from Idemitsu’s founding family, but the commission is still expected to announce decisions on both cases simultaneously as early as this fall. Both mergers are supposed to take place in April 2017.

Full Content: Asian Review

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