Brazil: Holcim and Lafarge are actively negotiating an agreement with Brazil's anti-trust council, Conselho Administrativo de Defesa Econômica (Cade), to gain approval for their merger.
The deal involves divestitures of 31% or 3.6Mt/yr of Lafarge and Holcim's joint cement production capacity in Brazil. The assets could be sold to single company or several bidders. Holcim is still bound to pay Cade a US$197m fine that was imposed due to cartel practices. Lafarge paid US$16.7m to Cade in 2007 to end the investigation into its practices.