Canonical research dossier
Q45 / Federal merger activity / Review process contextHow did transaction mix, clearance, adjusted denominators, and agency review practice change alongside the observed rate?
Hart-Scott-Rodino program / Second Request rate- FY2024
- 3.0%
- prior anchor
- Observed change
- -0.90 pp
- 1 year
- FY2025
- 2.1%
- latest anchor
- Current custody
- 1
- source record
Published signal
The observation behind the question
Latest reported federal fiscal year versus the immediately preceding fiscal year in the same HSR annual report series.The latest reported review rate is lower than the prior fiscal year. This is a program-activity comparison, not a finding about merger harm or enforcement effectiveness.
Second Requests and public enforcement actions are different stages with different timing rules. Their counts must not be treated as a finding that every reviewed or reported transaction was anticompetitive.Declared empirical track
Review process context
Test whether transaction mix, clearance, adjusted denominators, or agency practice moved alongside the review rate.- Evidence base
- 10 annual records / FY2016-FY2025
- Data status
- verified
- Confidence
- high
- Metric family
- hsr-second-request-rate
Evidence to collect
4 declared requests- 01
Adjusted transaction denominators, clearance counts, and agency allocation for both fiscal years.
- 02
Transaction-size and industry mix for matters entering the review pipeline.
- 03
Review-practice, process-rule, staffing, and reporting changes across the interval.
- 04
Second Requests, complaints, settlements, abandonments, and other outcomes kept as separate measures.
Current source custody
Evidence already attached to the observed signal
Collection requests above remain separate from these published source records.Second Requests and public enforcement actions are different stages with different timing rules. Their counts must not be treated as a finding that every reviewed or reported transaction was anticompetitive.
Research handoffs