“Staff attorneys at the U.S. Justice Department’s antitrust division are nearing a recommendation to block Comcast Corp.’s bid to buy Time Warner Cable Inc., according to people familiar with the matter,” David McLaughlin and Todd Shields report for Bloomberg.
“Attorneys who are investigating Comcast’s $45.2 billion proposal to create a nationwide cable giant are leaning against the merger out of concern that consumers would be harmed and could submit their review as soon as next week, said the people,” McLaughlin and Shields report. “The division’s senior officials will then decide whether to file a federal lawsuit seeking to block the tie-up… It’s unclear what the FCC’s position is on the deal.”
“Comcast could still fight any lawsuit in court or attempt to reach a settlement that would let the deal go ahead,” McLaughlin and Shields report. “The antitrust division and the FCC have been studying how the potential tie-up between the nation’s two biggest cable companies could reshape the cable landscape in the U.S. Such a deal would have implications for the future of the Internet and television, affecting how and where Americans can watch programming that is increasingly being delivered on platforms other than televisions with set-top cable boxes.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: So, not everyone in the U.S. DOJ’s antitrust division are brain-dead after all!
The U.S. needs more competition in the broadband Internet and cable television markets, not less.
