Aussie competition watchdog drops injunction against Tatts/Tabcorp merger

The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) has dropped its attempt to halt the Tatts/Tabcorp merger while it appeals a tribunal’s approval of the deal.

The competition regulator had originally sought an injunction to stop the deal completing while it filed an appeal against the Australian Competition Tribunal’s approval of the deal.

However the ACCC has withdrawn the injunction request, saying it will focus on the appeal instead.

The ACC had its first recommendation to block the deal ignored by the Tribunal, which gave Tatts and Tabcorp permission to merge, because there are “substantial” benefits to the ­public and there were “no material ­detriments weighed in the ­balance which are of significance or likely to arise that outweigh the benefits”.

However the ACCC told The Weekend Australian it had no choice but to appeal the tribunal’s decision.

“We felt that the basis of the tribunal’s decision, in three particular aspects, was a departure from what we thought was the usual and appropriate approach.

“We feel that there is a fair bit of logic in our position in the sense that counting only substantial detriments when you’re counting all benefits just seems strange.

“The court will have the final say and we respect that but at best these issues have to be clarified. We think the way these things have been applied in the past have a lot of logic to it, so we are hopeful we can convince the court of that.”

Aussie operator CrownBet has also appealed the tribunal’s approval of the deal and that case will be heard along with the ACCC’s appeal on 28 August.

Australian market analysts have suggested both appeals are unlikely to succeed with the deal scheduled to complete in Q4.