The Changing Nature of Antitrust Enforcement in Banking'S New Era

• Author: Mark W. Ryan,Brian W. Smith
• DOI: 10.1177/0003603X9604100213
• Published date: 01 June 1996
• Date: 01 June 1996
• Subject Matter: Article

The Antitrust Bulletin/Summer 1996

The changing nature

of

antitrust enforcement in

banking's new era

BY BRIAN W. SMITH* and MARK W. RYAN*

1. Introduction

481

The

1990's

have been marked by a dramatic increase in the size of

bank

mergers-420

deals in 1995 with an

aggregate

value

of

$73.1 billion.' Seven of the ten largest bank combinations in the

history

of

banking have been announced in the past year.? The

merger

wave

is

expected

to

continue,

largely

as a

result

of

removal

of

barriers to interstate banking pursuant to the Riegle-

Neal Interstate Banking and Branching Efficiency Act of 1994.3

*Partner in Mayer, Brown &Platt, Washington, D.C.

AUTHORS' NOTE: We gratefully acknowledge the assistance

of

Sean P.

Moylan, an associate at Mayer, Brown &Platt in the preparation

of

this

article.

Daniel

Kaplan, In the Year

of

the Big Deal, Aggregate Value

Tripled, AM. BANKER, Jan. 29, 1996, at 2A.

Barbara Rehm, Freshman Senator Pushes

for

Inquiry on Big Bank

Mergers, AM.

BANKER,

Nov. 8, 1995, at 4.

Riegle-Neal Interstate Banking and Branching Efficiency Act of

1994, Pub. L. No. 103-328, 108 Stat. 2338 (codified in scattered sections

of title 7 and title 12

of

the United States Code).

© 1996by Federal LegalPublications, Inc.