Budgetary Band-Aids

Last Friday, President Biden signed the Congress-approved stopgap spending bill, narrowly beating the weekend deadline that would have seen a lapse in funding for some government agencies and a partial government shutdown. 

The legislation extends last fiscal year’s spending levels for agriculture, veterans programs, transportation, housing, health programs and other federal operations until March 1, with funding for the rest of the government, including the Pentagon, expiring on March 8.

While this buys some time for appropriations committees to push through the dozen bills funding the government for FY2024, congressional leaders will need to contend with ongoing hard-line opposition. The far right House Freedom Caucus are expected to continue demanding steep spending cuts and other party-priorities including conservative immigration reform proposals, restrictions on abortion and other limits on government Democrats will not accept. 

As debates on funding key programs are likely to persist, organizations in relevant sectors who want to shape the conversation around these debates should consider arming their spokespeople with talking points for when they interact with policy reporters.

2023 marked the lowest level of global merger and acquisition activity in a decade, as economic uncertainty, market volatility and high interest rates weighed on dealmakers and contributed to the slump in deal volume. Despite this, FGS Global once again topped Mergermarket’s league tables as the #1 Global M&A PR firm by deal value and deal count. 

As CEOs grapple with geopolitical issues in their day-to-day business operations, M&A continues to be an important strategic avenue. Our pros have outlined some factors to consider in the increasingly complicated approvals process across the globe: 

• In the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department released new merger guidelines paving the way for stricter M&A thresholds. They introduced the Merger Filing Fee Modernization Act, which raises the filing fee for larger deals and proposed changes to the Hart-Scott Rodino notification report that would require additional documents and information to be included in pre-merger filings.

• The European Commission introduced a third level of M&A scrutiny – beyond the existing merger control and Foreign Direct Investment screening – with the Foreign Subsidies Regulation, aimed at assessing any distortions to M&A caused by foreign state subsidies.

• In the UK, following the highly contentious review of Microsoft / Activision Blizzard, the government issued a revised Strategic Steer to regulators at the Competitions and Markets Authority that re-emphasised the importance of supporting economic growth and encouraging investment through the merger regime. The regulators issued revised procedural guidelines, aimed at providing notifying parties with greater clarity and access to decision-makers during reviews. 

• China broadened the enforcement powers of the State Administration for Market Regulation.

• Canada removed the limit on penalties for anti-competitive practices.

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Over the next couple of months, federal agencies will be actively working to fulfill and implement various requirements outlined in President Biden’s October 2023 Executive Order on AI. 

Meanwhile, Congress has remained active on AI to start off the year, having held and scheduled multiple hearings to discuss the technology’s implications on journalism, the workforce (particularly across the federal government), and the criminal justice system, among others. 

It has also been reported by FedScoop that Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell (D-WA) is expected to unveil a series of bipartisan bills addressing AI in the coming weeks, which would mark a meaningful step on the issue from the chair of a key committee of jurisdiction. According to FedScoop, the bills being considered could include legislation to combat threats posed by deep fakes, a federal privacy bill targeting AI discrimination, a reskilling “GI bill” for AI and legislation on potential disruptions to jobs and education posed by AI. 

That said, the prospects of passing significant legislation during an election year within the current partisan environment in Congress remain murky at best, if not nearly impossible.