Sainsbury's to detail price cuts to win over watchdog for Asda deal- FT
March 18 (Reuters) - Sainsbury's and Walmart's Asda will provide a more specific commitment to cut prices in response to a negative provisional regulatory view by the competition watchdog of their proposed tie-up, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Monday.
Britain's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) dealt a potentially fatal blow to the deal last month saying its initial view was that the proposed 7.3 billion pound ($9.66 billion) takeover of Asda by Britain's No. 2 supermarket group would be blocked without the sale of a large number of stores, or even one of the brands.
The supermarkets will also recalculate a key indicator of consumer harm using what they consider to be more realistic criteria, and submit another proposal for store sales, the FT reported https://www.ft.com/content/24ca0d7e-4654-11e9-b168-96a37d002cd3, citing people briefed on the process.
Sainsbury's and Asda did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the FT report. ($1 = 0.7559 pounds) (Reporting by Noor Zainab Hussain in Bengaluru Editing by Alexander Smith)
