Will Hong Kong's new competition law have teeth?

The attitude of Hong Kong’s still-to-be-named competition commissioners will have as much say over rulings potentially impacting M&A as the actual legislation.

A Hong Kong ordinance mandating the establishment of a competition commission comes into effect in January 2014 but it is unlikely to have any real impact until 2015 -- and even that is unclear.

What the new regulatory framework will mean for mergers and acquisitions in Hong Kong won’t really be known until key personnel are put into place, because the attitude of the competition commissioners will be as important as the ordinance’s wording, according to a legal academic who was commenting upon the new ordinance, but who declined to be named.

The original version of this story incorrectly referred to the Hong Kong chief executive, rather than the chief executive...

¬ Haymarket Media Limited. All rights reserved.

FinanceAsia has updated its subscription model.

Registered readers now have the opportunity to read 5 articles from our award-winning website for free.

To obtain unlimited access to our award-winning exclusive news and analysis, we offer subscription packages, including single user, team subscription (2-5 users), or office-wide licences.

To help you and your colleagues access our proprietary content, please contact us at [email protected], or +(852) 2122 5222

Article limit is reached.

Hello! You have used up all of your free articles on FinanceAsia.

To obtain unlimited access to our award-winning exclusive news and analysis, we offer subscription packages, including single user, team subscription (2-5 users), or office-wide licences. To help you and your colleagues access our proprietary content, please contact us at [email protected], or +(852) 2122 5222