Oligopoly WatchThe latest maneuvers of the new oligopolies and what they mean(Untitled)- June 30, 2008 Waste deal aims at market controlWe've written earlier about the oligopoly in the highly corrupt solid waste industry. That oligopoly just got tighter.Republic services, the 2 waste disposal company in the US announced the acquisition of Allied Waste Industries, the 3 player in that area in the US. The value of the deal is for $6.1 billion, in a stock swap.The two companies combined own over 35,000 companies (employees), including waste haulers, landfills, and recycling companies The combined...http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/29.html#a1253 (Untitled)- June 27, 2008 Severstal buys EsmarkSeverstal, Russia's 1 steelmaker, has struck again in the US. It announced that its has won a bidding war to buy Esmark, a US steel products company in a $775 million deal. It beat out India-based Essar Steel. Esmark was willing to be bought out, thanks to difficulties sin getting financing.Severstal has been expanding: in the US, earlier this year, it bought ArcelorMittal's Sparrows Point steel plant near Baltimore for $950 million. ArcelorMittal was forced to divest the...http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/26.html#a1252 (Untitled)- June 25, 2008 Iron handIron ore giants Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton announced that they had come to agreements with key Chinese steelmakers, agreements that hike the base price of iron ore by 86% over a year ago. The combination of ever increasing demand, especially from China and India, along with the power that the three-company iron oligopoly has over the much more competitive steel industry did the trick. Iron ore is a sellers market, and there are only a few sellers.The price was the result of...http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/24.html#a1251 (Untitled)- June 24, 2008 King corn (syrup)With corn prices reaching stratospheric levels, it's only natural that these should be consolidation among the world leaders in buying and processing corn. At $7 a bushel, corn costs twice as much as it did a year ago, and with much of Iowa under water, the prices might climb even more. So when food processor Bunge announced the purchase of US-based Corn Products International for $4.2 billion (in stock) the concentration the food processing oligonomy only got tighter.While...http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/23.html#a1250 (Untitled)- June 23, 2008 Chinese-Indian pharma dealIt is significant, I think, when a company from one major Asian company buys another, with no Western company involves as buyer of seller. That' shat happened last week when the 3 Japanese drug company, Daichi Sankyo, announced a deal to buy a controlling share in Indian drug company Ranbaxy Laboratories, the 1 Indian drug firm. The deal was for around $4.6 billion. Daichi Sankyo is the result itself of a 2005 merger Japanese drug companies.Ranbaxy's specialty is...http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/22.html#a1249 (Untitled)- June 20, 2008 Copyright creepsWe have stated before that one of the trends of the last twenty years has been a frantic cycle of copyright extension. The major media companies have formed oligopolies and try to extend copyright protecting their materials. Technology is moving faster, so that the regulations are sidestepped and digital sharing grows. The content oligopolies then propose (and often get) ever more stringent laws, which create more resentment and even more copyright avoidance. Once oligopolies in.http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/19.html#a1248 (Untitled)- June 13, 2008 Organic oligopoly We've reported on it before, but here's a neat diagram showing the organic brands owned by the big multinational and national food and beverage giants.Thanks to reader Dave Pollard, edirtor of the always interesting How to Save The World blog.I'll be off on vacation for a few days.http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/13.html#a1247 (Untitled)- June 13, 2008 Big Pharma and "free" tradeI recently came across the excellent four-year-old Salon.com article by Adam Graham-Silverman ("Big Pharma's Free Ride", 81205) that details the way in which large drug companies managed to use the CAFTA trade agreement between the US and certain Central American companies) to wipe out competition in struggling economies. The Free Trade agreement may have opened some US markets to Central American goods, but for drug companies it was a field day. As the article notes,.http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/12.html#a1246 (Untitled)- June 12, 2008 Yet another beer deal SABMiller, the world&146;s largest brewing company (unless and until InBev manages to buy Anheuser-Busch), announced it would buy Russian brewer Vladpivo, located in Russia&146;s growing Far East in Vladivostok. It&146;s not much of a deal money-wise (the price is undisclosed, the assets of the company seem to be under $70 million). The deal will be SABMiller&146;s third location in Russia, where SABMiller is the leader (with Russian brands like Zolotaya Bochka, Tri...http://www.oligopolywatch.com/2008/06/11.html#a1245 |