The CMA has opened an investigation into eight housebuilders following evidence they may be sharing commercially sensitive information Full story: UK housebuilders investigated over possible information-sharing The CMA has the power to impose penalty fines of up to 10% of applicable turnover, if it concludes that a firm has broken competition law, points out Anthony Codling, analyst at RBC Europe Limited. Codling suggests that. two or more housebuilders who operate in the same local market could potentially share information to ensure that they don’t both build all their 2 and 3 bed homes at the same time, for example. The number of sites where more than one housebuilder operates in exactly the same local market will be in the minority in our view, and we do not believe that housebuilders can materially impact house prices in ways against the public interest. In our view they have more power to cut rather than increase house prices. There may be a few cases where information about house mix phases have been shared in order to increase the choice of homes built in any one period, but site plans are documents of public record. “Housebuilder stocks have fallen as the CMA launches a probe into the sector. Concerns include poor customer outcomes from the quality of new homes, with faults on the rise over the last ten years. A major trigger for the investigation is accusations that some major housebuilders are sharing confidential and commercially sensitive information relating to sales prices and sales rates. Continue reading...

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