The Federal Trade Commission and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice released for public comment a proposed revision of the Horizontal Merger Guidelines. See here. Public comments are being accepted until June 4, 2010.

The updated Guidelines outline how the federal antitrust agencies evaluate the likely competitive impact of mergers and whether those mergers comply with U.S. antitrust law. The Guidelines were issued by the two agencies in 1992 and were last revised in 1997. The revisions are designed to more accurately reflect the way the FTC and DOJ currently conduct merger reviews.