The UK’s CMA Shrinks The Scope Of Investigation Into Microsoft ABK Merger. Says "Won't Hurt Competition"

It’s taken a while, but the UK Competition and Markets Authority has decided to stop focusing on one concern in Microsoft’s buyout of Activision Blizzard. According to a report on CNBC published this morning, the organization listened to a good deal of feedback “from various industry participants” and after considering it, has decided to no longer focus on Sony’s concern that Microsoft may make Call of Duty exclusive.

A statement from the chair of the panel of experts that have been looking into this states that, “having considered the additional evidence provided, [they] have now provisionally concluded that the merger will not result in a substantial lessening of competition in console gaming services because the cost to Microsoft of withholding Call of Duty from PlayStation would outweigh any gains from taking such action.”

That’s probably not news to a lot of gamers. Consoles are expensive and many people only have one that they’re very partial to – whatever their reasons. A lot of folks who have been playing Call of Duty on the PlayStation aren’t going to want to (or be able to) spend hundreds of dollars on a new console just to be able to play one game, so it’s very likely that the company would lose big in Call of Duty sales. And software sales are really where the money is at.

That said, it was good enough news for those that like to play the stock market that Activision Blizzard stocks jumped following the ruling. Shares went up 5% after the news dropped, following a previous surge of 7%.