EU competition chief warns telecom firms against thoughts of major mergers

Telecom companies have been lobbying for years to back so-called in-market mergers

European competition chief Margrethe Vestager: 'No evidence suggests that more concentrated national markets lead to better outcomes.' Picture: AP/Virginia Mayo

Big telecoms mergers in Europe would cut competition and distort the eurozone’s prized single market, the EU’s competition chief Margrethe Vestager warned, in an apparent rebuttal of calls in a new EU report for more consolidation.

“No evidence suggests that more concentrated national markets lead to better outcomes,” Ms Vestager said at a conference in Brussels on Thursday.