BRUSSELS, April 4 (Reuters) – UBS (UBSG.S) has secured a short lived inexperienced gentle from EU antitrust regulators to finish its acquisition of Credit score Suisse (CSGN.S) however will nonetheless must request clearance beneath EU merger guidelines, the European Fee stated on Tuesday.
UBS got here to Credit score Suisse’s rescue final month with a merger engineered and bankrolled by the Swiss authorities.
In accordance with European Union merger guidelines, firms can solely full offers after securing EU antitrust approval or face fines as a lot as 10% of their combination turnover.
The EU antitrust enforcer stated the Swiss banks had requested for an exemption from this standstill obligation.
“Upon request of UBS and Credit score Suisse, the Fee has granted a derogation from the standstill obligation on the idea of Article 7(3) of the EU Merger Regulation,” the Fee stated in an e-mail to Reuters.
“The Fee discovered that the necessities for a derogation have been met and subsequently it authorized on 4 April 2023 the derogation request topic to situations.”
The banks have but to formally put in a request for EU approval of their deal. Such an software would kick off a 25-working day preliminary assessment of the transaction.
Reporting by Foo Yun Chee
Modifying by Mark Potter
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