Mergers: European Commission Approves Acquisition Of Hungarian Exchanges And Central Clearinghouse And Depository

The European Commission has cleared under the EU Merger Regulation the proposed acquisition of the Hungarian Budapest Stock Exchange (“BSE”), Budapest Commodity Exchange (“BCE”) and the Central Clearinghouse and Depositary (“KELER”) by a joint venture comprising the Austrian undertakings Wiener Börse AG, Oesterreichische Kontrollbank Aktiengesellschaft, Raiffeisen Zentralbank Österreich AG, Erste Bank der oesterreichischen Sparkassen AG and the Hungarian subsidiary of the German HVB Group, HVB Bank Hungary. The Commission concluded that due to the small size of the targets and the limited impact of the transaction, the operation would not significantly impede effective competition in the EEA or any substantial part of it.

RZB, Erste and HVBH are banks active in banking and financial services in Austria and Hungary. WBAG is the Vienna stock exchange and general commodity exchange, while OeKB provides specific capital market services and is the Austrian Central Securities Depositary. BSE and BCE operate respectively as the stock exchange and the commodity exchange of Hungary. KELER is the Hungarian Central Clearing House and Depositary of the exchanges, jointly owned by the exchanges and the National Bank of Hungary

Due to the rather small size of the transaction (the market capitalisation of the three exchanges together counts for less than 1% of the EEA market for stock exchange services) and due to the possible pro-competitive effects indicated by the market investigation, the Commission approved the merger. The market investigation also confirmed the common interest of these exchanges to keep trading fees low, in order to increase turnover and get new listings. The services performed by KELER, such as clearing and settlement, custody and depositary services seem to be sufficiently regulated and supervised by the Hungarian Financial Supervisory Authority under the Hungarian Capital Markets Act.

The transaction had to be notified to the Commission under the EU Merger Regulation due to the significant turnover of the banks present in the joint venture.