Insights

Historically, Wall Street banks were rarely the focus of government antitrust investigations or private antitrust litigation. But that changed in the wake of the Great Recession. While most observers believed that antitrust scrutiny of the financial services sector was reaching its end, recent lawsuits filed by the private antitrust bar—which has secured hundreds of millions in settlements in the last few years—strongly suggest otherwise. It appears that banks will continue to have to defend themselves in costly antitrust litigation for the foreseeable future, regardless of whether the Trump administration makes antitrust enforcement in the financial services sector a priority.