The US President Biden signs into law the 2023 spending bill which includes dramatically increasing funding for antitrust enforcers, and modernizing merger filing fees

In what appears to have been in part a trade for tabling new antitrust legislation, at least for now, the Biden administration dramatically increased funding for the Federal Trade Commission and the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice. It remains unclear whether this additional funding will increase the agencies’ success rates before the judiciary who will see no changes to the antitrust laws themselves. BUDGET INCREASES The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023 (the Spending Bill) increases the annual budget of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) from $376.5 million in FY 2022 to $430 million and the annual budget of the Antitrust Division of the Department of