Current Events > U.S. Judge Approves AT&T's $85 Billion Merger With Time Warner

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https://www.npr.org/2018/06/12/614092532/u-s-judge-approves-at-ts-85-billion-merger-with-time-warner
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Perfectly timed with Net Neutrality going down....nice

oh man
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Trumps America

where anti competitive monopolies are the new capitalism
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just to clarify(for people who dont read articles): This is Time Warner, not Time Warner Cable (which was a separate company). Time Warner is a media company that owns CNN, HBO, TNT, Cartoon Network, etc.
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halomonkey1_3_5 posted...

just to clarify(for people who dont read articles): This is Time Warner, not Time Warner Cable (which is a separate company). Time Warner is a media company that owns CNN, HBO, TNT, Cartoon Network, etc.

I just want to clarify that Time Warner Cable was sold off a long time ago to Charter who called the new company Spectrum.
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halomonkey1_3_5 posted...

just to clarify(for people who dont read articles): This is Time Warner, not Time Warner Cable (which is a separate company). Time Warner is a media company that owns CNN, HBO, TNT, Cartoon Network, etc.

Time Warner Cable does not exist anymore. They were bought by Charter and rebranded to Spectrum.
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Tyranthraxus posted...

I just want to clarify that Time Warner Cable was sold off a long time ago to Charter who called the new company Spectrum.

good catch, I forgot they dont exist anymore
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halomonkey1_3_5 posted...

just to clarify(for people who dont read articles): This is Time Warner, not Time Warner Cable (which was a separate company). Time Warner is a media company that owns CNN, HBO, TNT, Cartoon Network, etc.

in a way, that's worse. I'm more afraid of conglomeration of Internet and content providers than I am the ISP monopoly status quo

My buddy who ones a fuckton of Disney stock was sent a charter today to approve merger of fox and Disney #herewego
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cellb posted...

Perfectly timed with Net Neutrality going down....nice

Just a coincidence i'm sure
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so Alexander Graham Bell now owns Game of Thrones?

NeuralLaxative posted...

My buddy who ones a fuckton of Disney stock was sent a charter today to approve merger of fox and Disney #herewego

really? so they're not pursuing the Comcast offer? or are they voting on both before they decide on either.
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Medussa posted...

NeuralLaxative posted...

My buddy who ones a fuckton of Disney stock was sent a charter today to approve merger of fox and Disney #herewego

really? so they're not pursuing the Comcast offer? or are they voting on both before they decide on either.

The Comcast offer fell through, I thought.
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Tyranthraxus posted...

The Comcast offer fell through, I thought.

cool. I knew it wasn't what the Fox higher-ups wanted, but it was a higher raw value. Though I can't remember if that was before or after taxes, which would hit the Comcast offer more than the Disney one.
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spudger posted...

Trumps America

where anti competitive monopolies are the new capitalism

The DoJ was challenging the merger lol

Medussa posted...

NeuralLaxative posted...

My buddy who ones a fuckton of Disney stock was sent a charter today to approve merger of fox and Disney #herewego

really? so they're not pursuing the Comcast offer? or are they voting on both before they decide on either.

Comcast hasn't made its formal offer yet but they will now that this deal was approved.
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spudger posted...

Trumps America

where anti competitive monopolies are the new capitalism

Trump was very vocal in opposition to this deal. That's because Time Warner owns CNN and Trump hates CNN so he doesn't want them getting bigger.
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frozenshock posted...

spudger posted...

Trumps America

where anti competitive monopolies are the new capitalism

Trump was very vocal in opposition to this deal. That's because Time Warner owns CNN and Trump hates CNN so he doesn't them getting bigger.

jfc. not the reason to fight it but i guess its better than nothing.
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What a mess. This deal should have never gone through.

This is the type of capitalism you don't want. I don't know what the hell the judge was thinking. This is terrible for consumers.
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Trumpers wanted this.
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Yeah I gotta say, anytime $85b changes hands in the U.S, we all have an interest in what's going down. I say this as a huge proponent of the basics of capitalism.

I haven't read the arguments for or against but the obvious knee jerk response is outrage. This seems like an anti-consumer consolidation of industry.
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GreatEvilEmpire posted...

What a mess. This deal should have never gone through.

This is the type of capitalism you don't want. I don't know what the hell the judge was thinking. This is terrible for consumers.

Anarchy_Juiblex posted...

Yeah I gotta say, anytime $85b changes hands in the U.S, we all have an interest in what's going down. I say this as a huge proponent of the basics of capitalism.

I haven't read the arguments for or against but the obvious knee jerk response is outrage. This seems like an anti-consumer consolidation of industry.

Well the DoJ tried to argue that and he said:

Page 1: According to the government, consumers nationwide will be harmed by increased prices for access to Turner networks, notwithstanding the Governments concession that this vertical merger would result in hundreds of millions of dollars in annual cost savings to AT&Ts customers and notwithstanding the fact thatno competitor will be eliminated by the merger proposed vertical integration.

Page 4: Ultimately, I conclude that the Government has failed to meet its burden to establish that the proposed transaction is likely to lessen competition.

Page 38: The Governments own expert predicts that, due to a standard benefit of vertical integration, AT&Ts DirecTV and Uverse customers will pay a total of about $350 million less per year for their video distribution services.

Page 58: Given all of the competing considerations at play, the analysis of vertical mergers has been described as much more complex than the analysis of horizontal mergers. Things are made more difficult still by the lack of modern judicial precedent involving vertical merger challengesa dearth of authority that is unsurprising, considering that the Antitrust Division apparently has not tried a vertical merger case to decision in four decades!

He went into detail about the government's argument also:

Page 68: The Governments primary theory of harm to competition focuses on the challenged mergers integration of Turners important video contentcontent that includes, among other things, the networks CNN, TNT, and TBSwith AT&Ts video distributors, U-verse and DirecTV. Specifically, the Government contends that, should the challenged merger proceed, Turners relationship with AT&T will enable Turner to extract greater prices from AT&Ts rival distributors for its must-have content than it could without the merger. The Government argues that distributors would then pass on those price increases to their subscribers, resulting in an increase of hundreds of millions of dollars in annual consumer payments.

Page 75-76: Based on the evidence, I agree with defendants that Turners content is not literally must have in the sense that distributors cannot effectively compete without it. The evidence showed that distributors have successfully operated, and continue to operate, without the Turner networks or similar programmingI therefore give little credit to blanket statements by third-party competitor witnesses indicating that the entire viability of [their] video model could depend on whether they offer Turner programming.

Page 99: For the reasons discussed above, the Court is not convinced that the real-world objective evidence offered by the government provides sufficient support for its increased-bargaining leverage claim. That conclusion is further bolstered by evidence relating to three prior instances of vertical integration in the video programming and distribution industry.[Witness and expert testimony] both provide significant, real-world evidence indicating that, contrary to the Governments increased-leverage theory, these prior instances of vertical integration did not affect affiliate fee negotiations or content prices.
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Also AT&T and Time Warner had an expert who performed an analysis about the pricing change from the merger:

Page 101: Defendants, by contrast, did seek to analyze the available pricing data resulting from prior instances of vertical integration. Although they initially had trouble obtaining some of the relevant pricing data from the Government or third-partiesthey were eventually able to obtain the data after seeking relief from this Court. Defendants lead economic expert, Professor Dennis Carlton, then analyzed that third-party pricing data, among other proprietary and public-source data in his possession to test whether it is true that content prices are higher on a network when its sold by someone whos vertically integrated.


The government's witness was basically terrible in presenting his argument for the pricing changes:

First, I will explain why the evidence is insufficient to support Professor Shapiros conclusion that this Nash bargaining theory will accurately predict an increase of Turners postmerger bargaining leverage in affiliate fee negotiations with distributors. Second, I will examine Professor Shapiros economic bargaining model, concluding that the evidence is also insufficient to support the input values upon which he relied to generate his predictions of harm.

Page 114-115: The Court accepts Professor Shapiros (and the Governments) argument that, generally, a firm with multiple divisions will act to maximize profits across them.That profit-maximization premise is not inconsistent, however, with the witness testimony that the identity of a programmers owner has not affected affiliate negotiations in real-world instances of vertical integration. Rather, as those witnesses indicated, vertically integrated corporations have previously determined that the best way to increase company wide profits is for the programming and distribution components to separately maximize their respective revenues.

Page 131: The last piece of evidence upon which Professor Shapiro based his long-term subscriber loss rate is an internet survey. The internet survey wasconducted by another of the Governments testifying experts, Professor John Hauser, who heads the marketing department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The survey generated a long-term Turner blackout subscriber loss percentage of 12% and a 30-day Turner blackout subscriber loss percentage of a whopping 8.2%Although once at the forefront of the Governments presentation. Professor Hausers survey now finds itself in the background, with even Professor Shapiro minimizing his reliance on it. Professor Shapiro however had good reason to unhitch his analysis from Professor Hausers internet survey wagon: cross-examination and real world evidence alike revealed that the survey was inherently unreliable and produced inflated results!

Page 149: After hearing Professor Shapiros bargaining model described in open Court I wondered on the record whether its complexity made it seem like a Rube Goldberg contraption. Professor Carlton agreed at the trial that that was a fair description. But in fairness to Mr. Goldberg, at least his contraptions would normally move a pea from one side of a room to another. By contrast, the evidence at trial showed that Professor Shapiros model lacks both reliability and factual credibility, and thus fails to generate probative predictions of future harm associated with the Governments increased-leverage theory.
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TLDR: Challenging the merger in the first place was fairly unprecedented and the DoJ had an uphill battle to climb and did not argue their case well at all. Historically these types of mergers haven't been harmful to consumers and this was basically a giant waste of federal resources.
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halomonkey1_3_5 posted...

just to clarify(for people who dont read articles): This is Time Warner, not Time Warner Cable (which was a separate company). Time Warner is a media company that owns CNN, HBO, TNT, Cartoon Network, etc.

Because Time Warner merging with companies that do internet stuff has worked out so well in the past
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SK8T3R215 posted...

Also AT&T and Time Warner had an expert who performed an analysis about the pricing change from the merger:

They examined themselves.
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AT&T provides my internet service, AT&T provides my TV service. AT&T rules the fucking world.
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dave_is_slick posted...

SK8T3R215 posted...

Also AT&T and Time Warner had an expert who performed an analysis about the pricing change from the merger:

They examined themselves.

They had a third-party economic expert, Dennis Carltonan economist from the University of Chicagos Booth School of Business and a former deputy assistant attorney general in the DOJs Antitrust Division perform an analysis.

He does not work for AT&T. He used data from other vertical integrations and showed the pricing changes from them.

He used to work for the plaintiffs if anything.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-iX1SJKB5U" data-time="
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Zack_Attackv1 posted...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-iX1SJKB5U" data-time="

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