Vestager Warns Against Global Antitrust Race

Welcome to the Brussels Edition, Bloomberg’s daily briefing on what matters most in the heart of the European Union.

As more megadeals come under scrutiny, the EU’s antitrust chief warned against the risk of global regulators clamoring to be the first to pronounce on mergers, including Microsoft’s plan to buy Activision Blizzard. “We cannot be in a race, we need to serve the specific markets where we have jurisdiction,” Margrethe Vestager told us. The competition commissioner spoke out as her team narrowed a probe into Apple’s allegedly unfair treatment of music streaming firms, refocusing on curbs that prevent companies from steering users away from the App Store. Spotify has been one of Apple’s fiercest critics, pressing the EU’s antitrust enforcers into action with a complaint over how the Cupertino-based tech giant takes an unfair cut of its subscription fees.