Office Depot, Staples Merger Under Scrutiny in Europe

The $6.3 billion merger between the top two office supply chains has hit yet another bump: the European Union opened an “extensive” investigation into the would-be union of Staples and rival Office Depot. Reuters reports that EU antitrust regulators are probing the possibilities of price hikes should the two chains walk down the aisle. The EU said on Friday that the deal could hurt business customers with international contracts in Europe and those with national contracts in the Netherlands and Sweden.