UK Uses New National Security Powers to Probe 17 Business Deals

(Bloomberg) -- The UK scrutinized 17 corporate deals involving purchases of British assets in the first three months of the year, exercising new security powers that include allowing the government to pull apart acquisitions retrospectively.

Most Read from Bloomberg

• China Says It May Have Detected Signals From Alien Civilizations

• Stocks Jump as Powell Soothes Wall Street’s Nerves: Markets Wrap

• Fed Hikes 75 Basis Points; Powell Says 75 or 50 Likely in July

• World’s Central Banks Got It Wrong, and Economies Pay the Price

• Americans Are Building Vacation-Home Empires With Easy-Money Loans

Businesses and investors notified the government of 222 deals between Jan. 4 and March 31, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said on Thursday in an emailed statement. Seventeen of those were called in for further assessment, including transactions involving artificial intelligence and space technology firms, it said. Of those, three have been cleared and the remaining 14 were still being examined at the end of March.

The scrutiny was carried out using sweeping new powers introduced in January under the National Security and Investment Act that expanded the range of transactions open to government intervention for security reasons. The government made public its first probes under the law last month -- investigating both a Chinese-led takeover of a British semiconductor plant and a French tycoon’s increased stake in BT Group Plc.

UK Flexes Its New National Security Powers to Intervene on Deals

Thursday’s report from BEIS comes in the same week that the UK announced plans to take stakes in new nuclear projects, giving it special powers relating to national security. On Tuesday, the government said it had purchased an option to take a 20% stake in Electricite de France SA’s Sizewell C nuclear power plant. The move potentially eases the way to removing China General Nuclear Power Corp. from the project amid mounting concerns about increased Chinese involvement in critical aspects of UK infrastructure.

Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek

• Sheryl Sandberg’s Wedding Expenses Are the Least of Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg Problems

• Janet Yellen Is Struggling at the Treasury Job She Never Wanted

• A Ragtag Band of Hackers Is Waging Cyberwar on Putin’s Supply Lines

• A Billion-Dollar Crypto Gaming Startup Promised Riches and Delivered Disaster

• The Fed Tried to Protect Main Street. Now It May Have to Make Everyone Suffer

©2022 Bloomberg L.P.