Regulators approved music merger despite documented concentration metrics

Evidence

During the Universal-EMI antitrust hearings, an attorney estimated that the combined entity would control 42 percent of American recorded-music revenue, transforming the market from “moderately concentrated” to “highly concentrated” as defined by the Horizontal Merger Guidelines issued jointly by the DOJ and the Federal Trade Commission . Using 2011’s charts, UMG would have owned more than half of the titles on the Billboard Hot 100. Nevertheless, the merger was approved-and the diversity of major companies in the recording industry has dwindled from six in the late 1990s to just three multinational corporations today. — Andrew deWaard, Derivative Media, 197

Categorization

• QUESTION: Why did antitrust enforcement approve the Universal-EMI merger despite DOJ’s own Horizontal Merger Guidelines flagging it? Worth tracing the political-economy forces.