Facebook parent Meta admits defeat after $400 million Giphy deal blocked by UK regulators

Meta, the proprietor of Facebook, admitted decision Tuesday aft U.K. contention regulators issued a last verdict ordering the institution to merchantability its animated image-making portion Giphy.

Citing the hazard of a important lessening of contention successful the societal media and show advertizing market, the Competition and Markets Authority said Tuesday that Meta indispensable "sell GIPHY, successful its entirety, to a suitable buyer."

"We are disappointed by the CMA's determination but judge today's ruling arsenic the last connection connected the matter," a Meta spokesperson told CNBC by email.

"We volition enactment intimately with the CMA connected divesting GIPHY. We are grateful to the GIPHY squad during this uncertain clip for their business, and privation them each success. We volition proceed to measure opportunities - including done acquisition - to bring innovation and prime to much radical successful the UK and astir the world."

The $400 cardinal acquisition of Giphy was hardly 1 of the societal media giant's biggest. It has spent acold greater sums connected earlier deals, including the $1 cardinal acquisition of photo-sharing app Instagram and $19 cardinal buyout of encrypted messaging level WhatsApp.

But the CMA took issues with the takeover, specifically with the imaginable of Giphy relinquishing its ain ambitions successful integer advertising. The watchdog said this efficaciously "removed Giphy arsenic a imaginable challenger successful the UK show advertizing market."

The CMA is seeking to go a greater force successful the conflict among planetary regulators to rein successful Big Tech companies. Alongside the European Commission, it has respective ongoing high-profile investigations into the likes of Meta, Google and Apple, and wants powers from the authorities to levy bigger fines against tech giants implicit breaches of contention law.

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