Horizontal and vertical merger: The European Commission unconditionally clears a horizontal merger in the payment processing sector (Advent International/Bain Capital/Setefi Services/Intesa Sanpaolo Card)

*This article is an automatic translation of the original article, provided here for your convenience. Read the original article. In a decision of 10 August 2016, the European Commission authorised, after a phase 1 and without commitments, the acquisition of joint control of Setefi Services and Intesa Sanpaolo Card, two companies specialising in card payment processing, by the two US private equity funds Bain Capital and Advent International. The latter already holds control of Oberthur and is currently negotiating the acquisition of Morpho, Safran's subsidiary specialising in digital security. The Commission concluded that there was no risk of harm to competition as a result of the transaction due to the low market shares of the new