Conditional clearance : The French Competition Authority clears, subject to conditions, the acquisition of a sole control by a parent company which previously controlled jointly a joint venture active in the gas industry (Rubis)

*This article is an automatic translation of the original article, provided here for your convenience. Read the original article. This is a remarkable case in more ways than one. Firstly, it is remarkable because, while the change from joint to sole control is clearly a merger control issue, this type of transaction does not normally raise competition concerns (for a rare example of a detailed examination of a change from joint to sole control, see Aut. conc., déc. n°13-DCC-90 du 11 juillet 2013, Casino/Monoprix, obs. J.-M. Cot and A. Blanchet) . The acquisition of sole control of SARA by Rubis was also an exceptional case in that it took place in a context where the company in question had a de facto monopoly and was already subject to price regulation for almost all its activities.