关键词: 反垄断, 制度互补性, 反合谋执法, 并购审查

Abstract: Collusion and M&As （mergers and acquisitions） are two alternative strategies for enterprises to acquire market power Chinas antitrust enforcement adopts the delegated model，and horizontal collusion cases mainly rely on provincial law enforcement agencies to investigate and punish，while M&A activities relies on the Antimonopoly Law Enforcement Agency under the State Council to conduct prior review Utilizing the manually constructed horizontal monopoly agreement enforcement database alongside M&As data of Chinese enterprises，this paper analyzes the relationship between the breakdown of collusion and subsequent M&A activities，employing a panel twoway fixed effects model for analysis The results are as follows
Firstly，the suppression of collusion by provincial law enforcement agency has a notable deterrent effect，which significantly increases the number of M&As initiated by enterprises in the province The regression results show that，on average，the number of monthly M&As initiated by provincial enterprises increased by about 38% due to the investigation of collusion cases by provincial antimonopoly law enforcement agency In other words，M&As become a strategic response of enterprises to the crackdown on collusion by the provincial law enforcement agency
Secondly，the institutional arrangement in China，which mainly relies on provincial law enforcement agencies to combat collusion，reveals regional and industrial heterogeneity in strategic M&A activities The empirical analysis highlights several key insights：（1） The breakdown of collusion significantly boosts the number of M&As within the same province and within the same industry However，the impact on crossprovince and crossindustry M&As is not significant Further empirical analysis which distinguishes collusive industries from noncollusive industries found that，the crackdown on collusive industries by the provincial law enforcement agency significantly encouraged enterprises in collusive industries to initiate more M&As （2） The breakdown of collusion does not have a crossprovincial deterrent effect，and the breakdown of collusion in one province does not significantly promote more M&As initiated by enterprises in the same （collusion） industry in other provinces （3） Considering the cost of M&As，the strategic response to anticollusion enforcement shows firm heterogeneity The suppression of collusion by provincial law enforcement agency encourages firms with a high solvency ratio to initiate more M&As，while those with a low solvency ratio do not
The main innovation of this paper is to discover the substitution of merger and acquisition for collusion under Chinas antimonopoly law enforcement delegated model，especially the substitution effect has regional and industry heterogeneity，which is mainly significant within the province and industry The conclusion of this paper has some policy implications for Chinas antimonopoly law enforcement Antimonopoly law enforcement agency needs to pay attention to the strategic response of enterprises to anticollusion policy

Key words: antitrust, institutional complementarity, anticollusion enforcement, merger review