The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has tentatively announced that it no longer considers the deal between Microsoft and Activision Blizzard a threat to competition in the cloud gaming market. It was persuaded by the agreement that Microsoft signed with Ubisoft.

Through this agreement, Ubisoft will get the rights to distribute Activision Blizzard’s games through the cloud. According to the CMA, this will make the French company a key supplier in the cloud market. The UK regulator had previously feared that Microsoft would take this position.

In its statement, the CMA said the agency still had a number of questions for Microsoft. It will hold consultations until October 6 and will make a final decision by October 18.

On the morning of September 22, Activision Blizzard’s stock price went up. As Bloomberg noticed, in pre-market trading, their value rose by 2.2% to $94.39 apiece.

So investors reacted to the preliminary consent of the British regulator to approve the sale of Activision Blizzard to Microsoft Corporation. In the morning press release, the agency announced that Microsoft’s proposal to sell Ubisoft the rights to distribute Activision Blizzard games in cloud services “largely removes the previously expressed concerns and opens the way to the completion of the transaction”.

It should be noted that in case of successful completion of the deal, Microsoft will pay for each Activision Blizzard share only 61 cents more – $95.

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