The failing firm defense allows parties to an anticompetitive merger one of whom is a financially distressed firm to defend the merger by proving that enjoining it may generate no better, perhaps even worse, effects on market competition if the financially distressed firm will liquidate and exit the market. The problem with the doctrine lies in antitrust regulators having to make highly uncertain predictions as to the state of competition in the market if the merger is allowed or enjoined. As a result, in practice, regulators are pushed to extremes, succumbing to either type I errors (enjoining mergers that should have been approved) or type II errors (approving mergers that should have been blocked). For example, in the United States, more than eighty years after its introduction into case-law, the doctrine is rarely invoked or accepted—a state of affairs suggesting the presence of type I errors. The paper offers a novel approach that arguably could better minimize the costs of both types of errors combined. We argue that rather than merely approve or disapprove of the merger antitrust regulators should also consider a third possibility: approval of the merger under the condition that the State receive an equity stake in the merged entity in proportion to the actual post-merger decrease in market competition. The decrease in competition and the subsequent dilution of incumbent equityholders in favor of the State is to be decided ex-post-facto by comparing the change in an agreed upon competition measure (for example, the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index, or even generally the market price) before and after the merger, even at several time intervals (to reverse the process, if necessary), and by translating such a change to an amount of (hypothetical) monetary compensation, to be paid by the issuance of equity-rights to the State. Such an approach transforms the ex-ante complex and uncertain regulatory decision transforms to a rather simple * College of Law & Business (CLB), Ramat-Gan, Israel. Email: rotem@clb.ac.il. ** Phd (Law, BIU) Phd (Economics, UC Berkeley); Bar Ilan University. 1 Words of the Danish physicist Niels Bohr, as quoted in Alan G. Mencher, On the Social Deployment of Science, 27 BULL. ATOMIC SCI. 34 (December 1971), at 37.

中文翻译：

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失败的企业防御-一种基于权益的方法

失败的公司辩护允许反竞争合并的当事方通过证明如果财务陷入困境的公司将清算并退出该合并会不会对市场竞争产生更好，甚至更坏的影响，其中一方是财务陷入困境的公司可以为合并辩护。市场。该理论的问题在于，如果允许或禁止合并，反托拉斯监管机构必须对市场竞争状况做出高度不确定的预测。结果，在实践中，监管者被推到了极点，屈服于第一类错误（包括应被批准的合并）或第二类错误（批准应被阻止的合并）。例如，在美国将其引入判例法八十多年后，该学说很少被引用或接受—一种事务状态表明存在I类错误。本文提供了一种新颖的方法，可以更好地将这两种类型的错误的总和降到最低。我们认为，反托拉斯监管机构不仅要批准或不赞成并购，还应考虑第三种可能性：在国家按照与合并后实际市值减少成比例获得合并实体股权的条件下批准合并竞争。竞争减少以及现有股权持有者随后对国家有利的稀释，将通过事后比较比较商定的竞争衡量标准（例如，赫芬达尔·赫希曼指数，甚至一般来说是市场）的变化来决定。价格）即使是在几个时间间隔内（如果需要，也可以颠倒该过程），并将这种变化转化为（假设的）货币补偿金额，则可以通过向国家发行权益来支付。这种方法将事前的复杂变化和不确定的监管决策转变为相当简单的*以色列拉马特甘法学院（CLB）。电子邮件：rotem@clb.ac.il。**博士学位（法律，BIU）博士学位（经济，加州大学伯克利分校）；巴伊兰大学。1丹麦物理学家尼尔斯·玻尔（Niels Bohr）的话，引用于艾伦·门彻（Alan G. Mencher），《科学的社会部署》，第27期。原子SCI。34（1971年12月），第37页。这种方法将事前的复杂变化和不确定的监管决策转变为相当简单的*以色列拉马特甘法学院（CLB）。电子邮件：rotem@clb.ac.il。**博士学位（法律，BIU）博士学位（经济，加州大学伯克利分校）；巴伊兰大学。1丹麦物理学家尼尔斯·玻尔（Niels Bohr）的话，引用于艾伦·门彻（Alan G. Mencher），《科学的社会部署》，第27期。原子SCI。34（1971年12月），第37页。这种方法将事前的复杂变化和不确定的监管决策转变为相当简单的*以色列拉马特甘法学院（CLB）。电子邮件：rotem@clb.ac.il。**博士学位（法律，BIU）博士学位（经济，加州大学伯克利分校）；巴伊兰大学。1丹麦物理学家尼尔斯·玻尔（Niels Bohr）的话，引用于艾伦·门彻（Alan G. Mencher），《科学的社会部署》，第27期。原子SCI。34（1971年12月），第37页。