A judge has approved the AT&T merger with Time Warner, rejecting government argument it would hurt pay-TV consumers and competition.
U.S. District Judge Richard Leon announced his decision in court Tuesday, June 12 in the biggest antitrust trial in years. The Trump Justice Department sued to block the $85 billion merger, arguing that it would hurt competition in pay TV and cost consumers hundreds of millions of dollars more to stream TV and movies.
The mega-merger is a high-stakes bet by AT&T Inc. on the synergy between companies that produce news and entertainment and those that funnel it to consumers — who spend more time watching video on phones and tablets and less time on traditional live TV on a big screen.
Approval of the combination is a stinging defeat for the Justice Department, which could move to appeal Leon’s ruling. The proposed merger was so big and consequential that it drew the government’s first lawsuit in decades to block a merger of two companies that don’t directly compete. First floated in October 2016, the deal also brought fire from then-candidate Donald Trump, who promised to kill it “because it’s too much concentration of power in the hands of too few.”
This is a developing story … Stay tuned for updates.