U.S. Justice Department files lawsuit to stop sugar merger

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The department said it filed the lawsuit because the proposed transaction would likely mean higher prices for refined sugar in the southeastern United States.

“U.S. Sugar and Imperial Sugar are already multibillion-dollar corporations and are seeking to further consolidate an already cozy sugar industry,” said Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.

U.S. Sugar announced in March that it would buy Imperial Sugar, which has operations in Georgia and Kentucky, from Louis Dreyfus Co.