Who are we?
ClearanceWire helps shareholders and investment professionals understand deal risks posed by the EU when it reviews mergers, acquisitions and investments. This site helps ClearanceWire - real name Peter Beckett - talk about the things in merger control, foreign subsidies and antitrust that he finds interesting.
ClearanceWire also offers tailored research services to institutional investors who need up to the minute guidance on how political risk might affect them. It’s only available to a limited number of clients at a time, so send over an email to check if there’s an opening.
Why now?
In a world where geopolitical power trumps international rules, determining who can buy what is no longer just a regulatory decision. It’s one that impacts security and critical supply chains. It’s one that can act as a carrot or a stick. It can be a chance to get valuable information on your geopolitical rivals, or even your allies. In short, it’s no longer a regulatory decision. It’s much more political.
Regulatory decisions now move markets. Who clears when — and on what terms — drives spreads, risk premia, and deal viability. Event-driven investors want to model regulatory timing and risk with the same precision as financing spreads or FX hedges. But the information flow around merger control and foreign subsidies clearances — especially in Europe — remains fragmented, delayed, and often written for academics, lawyers or policymakers, not investors and practitioners.
Add the Foreign Subsidies Regulation (FSR) — which now runs in parallel to EU merger control — and the regulatory burden on many cross-border deals has effectively doubled. FSR casts a wider net than even those who conceived of it thought likely: over 60% of FSR notification are deals led by private equity firms.
ClearanceWire tracks EU merger control and FSR cases through a single, practitioner-driven lens.
In addition to the analysis available here, we also provide bespoke analysis to investors who need to to identify regulatory risks before they impact a company’s fundamentals. Our service is personalised to your needs, responds to your questions and is delivered in person or over the phone when it suits you.
ClearanceWire’s web content is written by Peter Beckett unless we’ve managed to get a guest in to pass on their perspective; Peter spends most of his life having coffee with as many people as he can in Brussels’ competition world, so he’s both well informed and over-caffeinated.
