Originally Posted by
DH121
Do the government have a "golden share" or veto?
What about competion legislation? Two companies and one owner is not competion.
No, the government do NOT have a golden share or veto. They have their 28% stake, 1 share = 1 vote. Simple. And someone asked about advisors? Aer Lingus are being advised by Goldman Sachs (despite UBS doing their IPO
and Ryanair is being advised by Morgan Stanley, amongst others)
As for competition.. I spoke with MoL yesterday
and he's certainly well prepared for this battle. His lawyers have already prepared their submission to the EU Competition regulator. But yes, you're right, the regulators will NOT accept any argument that running the two seperately constitutes 'competition' in the way it does between two seperately owned entities.
The people who will be losing the most sleep over this will be BA. IMO, this deal is all about securing slots at LHR - the most prized (and scarce) asset in global aviation. It's almost a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity whereby 24 slots at LHR become available in one big block. The nly other slots sold over the last 4 years have been some of Swissairs, a couple of Uniteds (when they announced stopping of LHR-JFK services) and Malev's switch to LGW.
Only going to buy AI and simply apply his low-cost model to it but not touch anything else? Bullsh*t.
