YOU LOVE TO SEE IT: Big Grocery’s Merger Diet

Friends:

Good things are happening! A supermarket merger gets called off, a federal watchdog clamps down on major junk fees, the Supreme Court dismisses a crypto fraud plea and turns away a bunch more cases that would not have ended well.

Rock the boat.

Kroger’s Merger Diet

Federal and state judges on Tuesday blocked what would have been the biggest grocery store merger in American history. At the request of the Federal Trade Commission, Judge Adrienne Nelson of U.S. District Court in Oregon halted Kroger’s $25 billion acquisition of rival grocery chain Albertsons hours before a Washington judge made an identical ruling. 

The next day, Albertsons backed out of the deal and sued its rival for billions in damages for failing to push for regulatory approval, cementing the end of the relationship between the two grocery store giants.