| Capital One Should Discover
Merger Dead as FTC Hits Kroger
& Inner City Press FOIAs Fed
by
Matthew R. Lee
SOUTH
BRONX,
Feb 26 – Capital One will
apply to buy Discover, in an
anticompetitive deal that
should be rejected by
regulators if they mean what
they have been saying. Public
hearings should be held, not
only on antitrust but also
lending disparities at both
companies.
On
February 20 Capital One CEO
Rich Fairbanks bragged about
communications he's had with
the regulators, then referred
to "customary regulatory
approvals." Inner City Press
immediately submitted Freedom
of Information Act requests to
the Federal Reserve and OCC
for all such communications.
Both agencies confirmed
receipt.
But still
no records as of February 26,
when the FTC came out against
Kroger's proposed $24.6B
purchase of Albertsons, saying
it "threatens shoppers &
workers." So how could Capital
One / Discover be approved?
The call, a
transcript of which was not
posted hours later, consisted
of largely craven questions
from Capital One's stable of
"analysts," including Goldman
Sachs' Ryan Nash, TD Cohen's
Moshe Orenbuch, from Citi an
Aaron sitting in for Jill
Shea, and finally JPMorgan's
Rich Shane, who said "I'm not
big on saying this on calls,
but... congratulations."
Really.
As
documented by Fair Finance
Watch, Discover Bank in 2022
denied mortgage loans
application from African
Americans more than twice as
frequently as those of
whites.
Previously, Inner City Press
and NCRC challenged Capital
One's acquisition of ING
Direct, see here.This
time, given the antitrust
enforcement claims being made
in DC, this proposal should be
dead in the water. Watch this
site.
***
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