WAMS Middle East & North Africa review

In the past two years, the Middle East and North Africa ("MENA") region has witnessed very active developments in the area of merger control: new regimes have come into effect (and others are under development), several competition authorities have published new guidelines, regulators have increased enforcement efforts, and merger filings are still on the rise. In this WAMS update, White & Case provides insights specifically on recent developments and merger control trends in Egypt, Morocco, and Saudi Arabia.

Egypt

Egypt amended its competition law with new mandatory premerger filing requirements, which went into effect in June 2024.¹ Since then, the Egyptian Competition Authority ("ECA") has been actively enforcing the new reporting regime and has published guidelines and responses to frequently asked questions to help stakeholders comply with the new rules.

It is estimated that the ECA has reviewed at least 115 filings between June 2024 and September 2025. The results of the filings so far are as follows:

• Based on ECA data and White & Case analysis of press announcements, approximately 88% of all mergers were cleared with no issue, 87% in 2024 and 92% in 2025.
• An additional six mergers were granted conditional clearances by Egypt's merger agency in 2024, as well as one in 2025.
• Including those mergers approved subject to remedies, 109 of the 115 total mergers were approved by the ECA, meaning that 94% of all mergers were granted some form of approval.² The remaining mergers were either dismissed or under review – the ECA has not blocked any transactions to date.

The Egyptian merger control regime provides for a 30-business day merger review period and, if the transaction raises competitive issues, the possibility of a 60-business day second phase review. Alternatively, for transactions that meet certain conditions (e.g., a joint venture with no local nexus), the rules provide an alternative simplified procedure that requires only a 20-business day review period. These statutory periods start only after the ECA deems the filing complete, which can take time if the ECA issues requests for additional information or documents.

Egyptian Review Periods. While there is no data available yet on the ECA's average merger review period, parties are advised to prepare for longer waiting periods from the initial filing submission until the ECA issues its decision than the formal statutory timelines would suggest.

View fulle image: Egypt Merger Filings and Resolutions (PDF)

Morocco

Morocco has been an active antitrust jurisdiction for several years, with a notable increase in activity since 2023.

In 2023, the Moroccan government published new regulations governing its filing regime, which among other things, introduced a new local nexus test for Moroccan filings that excludes filing requirements for transactions where the target entity has no link to Morocco. As shown below, this new nexus condition has helped to reduce the number of filings submitted to the Moroccan Competition Council ("MCC"). This change likely helps focus the MCC's resources on more relevant transactions.

The MCC has also issued substantial fines against both global and local businesses for merger control violations of Moroccan law in the last two years.³ White & Case is aware of at least three transactions where the parties were fined approximately €1 million for failing to file a notifiable transaction, and one fine against a global pharmaceutical company in an amount equal to 2.5% of its local revenue. The maximum penalty for failure to file a notifiable transaction is 5% of the violating company's local revenue.

White & Case analyzed MCC data to track trends in merger filings in Morocco. As shown in the WAMS chart below, merger filings in Morocco saw a substantial spike in 2023, and a drop in 2024. In 2022, there were 142 merger filings in Morocco, 204 in 2023, and 162 in 2024. Thes numbers show a 43% increase in merger filings in 2023 over 2022 and a 20% drop from 2023 to 2024.

Those mergers notified in Morocco were consistently approved at very high rates: 95% in 2022, 93% in 2023, and 95% in 2024.⁴

View full image: Morocco Annual Merger Filings and Authorizations (PDF)

Saudi Arabia

Saudi Arabia has been the most active jurisdiction in merger control activity in the MENA region, and this year continues the trend.

Among other key developments this year, in April 2025, Saudi Arabia's General Authority for Competition ("GAC") published the 5^th edition of its Economic Concentration Review Guidelines (also known as the Merger Review Guidelines).⁵ These Saudi merger guidelines clarified and updated its notification thresholds, including creating different thresholds for acquisitions and introducing new exemptions for certain joint ventures and transactions by investment funds.

The GAC continues to receive the most merger filings as compared to other jurisdictions in the region. Although the data shows that the GAC received a relatively steady number of filings between 2022 and 2024, the fact that these numbers have held steady is significant since Saudi Arabia took significant steps to attempt to reduce the number of filings that trigger a filing requirement. For example, the GAC raised its turnover notification thresholds twice during that period and introduced new exemptions to exclude more transactions from filing requirements.⁶

The GAC has been on a record-breaking pace through the first 9 months of 2025, having received 300 Saudi merger filings in that time. This nearly matches the annual totals of the previous three years.⁷

View full image: Saudi Arabia Merger Filings and Resolutions by Year (PDF)

As shown above, the vast majority of transactions filed at the GAC are either approved or dismissed on the basis that no filing was required.

• Two mergers were conditionally approved in the first three quarters of 2025, and only three were conditionally approved in the prior three years, all in 2023.
• Last year, the GAC also fined two companies totaling SAR 800,000 (approximately USD 213,000) for failing to file premerger notification.⁸

Saudi Review Periods. These merger reporting trends come at a time when the GAC is accelerating the speed of reviews. White & Case's merger control team has witnessed a significant decrease in the average time from filing a transaction in Saudi Arabia to clearance, and GAC's 2025 data thus far supports this.

According to the GAC, the average time for reviewing merger filings (also known as "no-objection requests") in Q3 was 4.1 days, down from 5.6 days in Q2 2025, and 8 days in Q1 2025.⁹ While these averages do not account for the time between the initial filing and when the GAC deems it complete, in practice, the GAC has significantly reduced its requirements—and therefore the time to comply—during that initial period. This has resulted in an overall drop of the total time from filing to clearance.

Jim Canfield (Professional Support Lawyer, White & Case, Washington, DC), Jana Hatem (Trainee Associate, White & Case, Cairo) and Shaden Amr (Legal Intern, White & Case, Cairo) contributed to the development of this publication.

_{1 See White & Case alert, Key Takeaways from the New Egyptian Merger Control Guidelines | White & Case LLP (whitecase.com) (May 2024).
2 For data between June 2024 and December 2024, see ECA Statistics on Merger Control During the Period from June 2024 to December 2024.  For 2025, see the ECA's announcements of notified economic concentrations (available in Arabic).
3 See White & Case alerts, Morocco Competition Council Announces Merger Control Amendments | White & Case LLP (whitecase.com) (June 2023) and Global merger control trends and outlook 2024/2025 | White & Case LLP (whitecase.com) (January 2025).
4 See Morocco's Competition Council 2024 Annual Report.
5 See GAC Economic Concentration Review Guidelines (April 2025).
6 See White & Case alert, Saudi Arabia's General Authority for Competition increases its merger control notification thresholds | White & Case LLP (whitecase.com) (April 2023).
7 See GAC Economic Concentration Statistics for Q1 2025 and Q2 2025.
8 See White & Case alert, Saudi Arabia's competition authority fines companies for failure to file merger control notification | White & Case LLP (whitecase.com) (March 2024).
9 See GAC Economic Concentration Statistics for Q1 2025, Q2 2025, and Q3 2025.}

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_{This article is prepared for the general information of interested persons. It is not, and does not attempt to be, comprehensive in nature. Due to the general nature of its content, it should not be regarded as legal advice.}

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