American private equity firm Blackstone Group has secured the EU antitrust approval to acquire a majority stake in Thomson Reuters’ Financial and Risk (F&R) unit.
The F&R business offers fundamentals, estimates and primary and secondary research, as well as tools for financial markets professionals.
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Blackstone Thompson Reuters deal: why does it matter?
The deal, announced in January this year, values the F&R business at $20bn and will fetch around $17bn in gross proceeds for Thomson Reuters.
Under the agreement, Blackstone will buy a 55% stake in the F&R business while Thomson Reuters will own the remaining stake.
Thomson Reuters plans to use the deal proceeds to pay down debt and taxes, and grow its legal and tax and accounting businesses.
The Commission said that the deal would not raise competition concerns despite resulting in several overlaps between the operations of the two businesses.
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By GlobalData“Following its market investigation, the Commission concluded that the proposed transaction would raise no competition concerns given the limited market shares of the companies, the fact that a number of competitors will remain in the market post-transaction, and the fact that Blackstone accounts for only a minimal share of the demand for Thomson Reuters F&R’s products,” European Commission said in a statement.”
