how the hart scott rodino antitrust improvements act of 1976 works
once companies file the required forms a waiting period begins the waiting period is usually 30 days or 15 days for cash tender offers or an acquisition in bankruptcy 6 the transaction can proceed once the waiting period ends or if the government terminates the waiting period early if regulators see potential anti competitive issues with the proposed merger they will request additional information from the companies involved and extend the waiting period they will negotiate an agreement with the companies to enact measures to restore competition or they will seek to stop the transaction by filing a preliminary injunction in court 6 under the hsr act the following tests must be met to require a pre merger filing for 2020 the base filing threshold for the hsr act which determines whether a transaction requires a premerger notification is 904 million the statutory size of person threshold is between 18 8 million and 188 million alternatively the statutory transaction size test that applies to all transactions even if the size of person threshold is not met is 376 million 7 special considerationshsr forms carry a filing fee that varies depending on the size of a transaction for example transactions worth more than 94 million but less than 188 million require a 45 000 filing fee transactions valued at more than 188 million but less than 940 1 million incur a 125 000 filing fee the filing fee is 280 000 for transactions greater than 940 1 million 8 