San Francisco-based investment company ValueAct Capital has been ordered by the US Department of Justice (DOJ) to pay $11m in fines for violating antitrust laws during the failed merger of Halliburton and Baker Hughes earlier this year, according to Reuters.
ValueAct is accused of failing to declare to anti-trust authorities that it made multibillion-dollar stock buys in both the oilfield services giants.
After Baker Hughes and Halliburton announced their intended $35 billion merger, ValueAct purchased over $2.5 billion of voting shares in the two firms.
The investment firm, which manages around $16bn in assets, had claimed it was a passive investor when it made the purchases but then became involved in the merger review.
This $11m fine is the biggest ever levied for such an offence, almost doubling the previous of $5.67m. But it could have been worse from ValueAct’s point of view as the US government had wanted a $19m fine.
