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Union Pacific to buy Norfolk in $85B mega U.S. railroad deal
- bix6 1y agoWhat happened to antitrust? We were making great progress and then a few months ago this admin totally flipped?
- avs733 1y ago[flagged]
- M95D 1y ago[flagged]
- jt2190 1y ago> The transaction faces numerous regulatory hurdles and will serve as a key test of the changed thinking around antitrust issues under President Donald Trump. In other words, the companies have agreed to merge, but regulators will still have to approve.
- bix6 1y agoWhich they inevitably will. They’ve completely softened in the last few months. I think L*tnick has more power now?
- zanecodes 1y agoWe were making great progress under the previous administration until six months ago, yes.
- M95D 1y agoOh, no, you were not! The fact that it's way worse now, doesn't mean you had "great progress" before.
- idiotsecant 1y agoI think it's pretty much indisputable that the FTC was making huge progress in consumer rights and antitrust work. What, specifically, are you talking about in your comment. It's easy to make comments like this based on general 'feelings' without saying anything at all.
- sidewndr46 1y agoWhat great progress was made under the previous administration?
- zanecodes 1y agoAmong many others: https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/09/ftc-sues-prescription-drug-middlemen-artificially-inflating-insulin-drug-prices https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/09/... https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/10/ftc-proposes-rule-ban-junk-fees https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/10/... https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/06/ftc-sues-walmart-facilitating-money-transfer-fraud-fleeced-customers-out-hundreds-millions https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/06/... https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-ftc-accuses-intuit-deceptively-advertising-free-tax-filing-2022-03-29/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-ftc-accuses-intuit-decep... https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/06/ftc-puts-online-marketplaces-notice-about-their-responsibilities-under-new-inform-consumers-act https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/06/... https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/08/ftc-states-sue-rental-listing-platform-roomster-its-owners-duping-prospective-renters-fake-reviews https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2022/08/...
- sidewndr46 1y agoFTC sues, FTC proposes, FTC accuses. I see no actual change here.
- ethagknight 1y agoNone of those are antitrust, those are just examples of basic consumer complaints.
- gruez 1y agoThe case for merger is that the the two lines don't really overlap, so it (arguably) won't decrease competition. Meanwhile a larger network would make things more efficient for shippers because goods can travel coast to coast without changing trains. https://archive.is/65ihv https://archive.is/65ihv
- jordanb 1y agoThis is absurd and easily and trivially disputed. Having a nationwide network absolutely lets you compete with networks that are more regional "If you want to use our western routes you have to use us in the east too." > larger network would make things more efficient for shippers LOL > goods can travel coast to coast without changing trains They already can.
- gruez 1y ago>They already can. I'm not a railroad expert, but here's the exact quote from the article, which cites a consultancy: >Going from coast to coast is a greater prize. Avoiding interchanges between networks would mean faster trains and fewer delays. According to Oliver Wyman, a consultancy, the share of intermodal goods in America that travel by rail on journeys longer than 1,500 miles increases from 39% to 65% when served by a direct line. Transcontinental railways would mean fewer lengthy stops in Chicago and may make shorter routes near the Mississippi river more profitable. Maybe Oliver Wyman is on the payroll of UP/Norfolk and this isn't true, but I'd like to see something more reputable than a HN comment of 1-3 word refutations.
- jordanb 1y ago"Interchange" means the train going from one company's tracks to another. It does not involve changing trains. It involves a phone call. Additionally, it probably still wouldn't be possible for most origins and destinations from going coast to coast without interchange because will probably have to use shortline tracks at some point, like the Chicago Belt Railway.
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- dashundchen 1y agoUnder Biden, FTC commissioner Lina Khan was returning the agency to enforcing anti-trust and anti-monopoly laws. I think she correctly identified corporate consolidation, collusion and legally entrenched middlemen as a threat to the working class and economic competitiveness. Her record wasn't 100% wins but I think she was setting the stage for a much more impactful 4 years had Biden or Harris won. I think she was one of the reasons big tech and oligarchs fell into line for Trump. Now we're stuck with the most openly corrupt and transactional corporate administration in US history. A good interview on her philosophy: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/19/opinion/lina-khan-monopolies-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/19/opinion/lina-khan-monopol...
- morkalork 1y agoCan you really call it a new Gilded Age without railway barons?
- dowager_dan99 1y agoMy money says this will get regulatory approval to compete with the CPKC which goes both east-west and north-south from Canada to Mexico. In this climate a rail network from coast to coast entirely in the continental US is probably viewed as "national security".
- AnimalMuppet 1y agoI don't see CPKC as a reason for approving this. It won't compete with them in Canada or Mexico at all (since neither UP nor NS go there). And it won't compete much with them in the US, since CPKC pretty much just does north-south in the middle of the country. I mean CPKC might be the excuse, but that's not the same thing...
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- snapplebobapple 1y agoWhat happened to antitrust is you guys had an antitrust system that was going way too far (think breaking up regional gas stations too far) and then nixon appointed Rehnquist to the supreme court in 1972, then Reagan appointed him chief justice in 1986. Rehnquist made decent arguments for reforming that that were then taken too far over his tenure (and continuing to this day) and now we have multinational oligopolies. Taking a good idea too far, making it an extremely bad idea is basically the theme of the pendulum swings of human history.
- pc86 1y agoYou guys? How many people on HN do you think were around so that they could vote for Nixon in 1968?
- iwontberude 1y agoGiven demographics of HN they probably is British and talking to Americans
- snapplebobapple 1y agoBritish North American sir! Aka Canadian.
- lqet 1y agoI think that referred to Americans
- snapplebobapple 1y agoIt did, but I was so pleasantly surprised they were choosing to be offended due to incorrectly attributing my statement to ageist biases rather than racist biases that I was going to just let it slide. It was so nice to get some variety in the incorrectly offended miasma that is the modern internet....
- bix6 1y agoI meant more recently. Lina Khan was making progress and even Tr*mp seemed to be taking a harder line on the tech companies in particular.
- tallanvor 1y agoIt's hard to say if this would be approved even under a normal administration. If UP and NS get to merge, I would expect BNSF and CSX to try and do the same, leaving just two national train companies. But there are still hundreds of Class II and Class III railroads operating in the US, so as long as there are concessions made to ensure long-term trackage rights, it would not necessarily be rejected out of hand.
- FollowingTheDao 1y agoThis would have went through under either an R or D administration. Union Pacific gave 2x more to all politicians than CSX. https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/union-pacific-corp/summary?id=D000000118 https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/union-pacific-corp/summary?... https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/csx-corp/summary?id=D000000148 https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/csx-corp/summary?id=D000000...
- SilverElfin 1y agoYes they flipped. Lina Khan should have supported mergers for smaller companies (to help startups needing an exit) while breaking up the largest and most abusive companies like Google or Amazon or Microsoft. Unfortunately now more will come. Warren Buffett is more likely to pursue his own rail merger for BNSF (owned by Berkshire Hathaway): https://www.semafor.com/article/07/21/2025/berkshire-bnsf-bankers-railroad-merger https://www.semafor.com/article/07/21/2025/berkshire-bnsf-ba...
- bix6 1y agoOk but even ignoring her this admin totally flipped? Tr*mp was taking a much harder line and now he’s letting everything through?
- khuey 1y agoIf you thought Trump believed in anything beyond whatever is good for Trump right now you fell for the con.
- uoaei 1y agoCould you explain why you think any "startup" "needs an exit"? Why should we accept businesses that cannot persist on their own? This comment caught me off guard with how blatantly VC-sycophantic it is.
- FollowingTheDao 1y ago> Could you explain why you think any "startup" "needs an exit"? Because it is, and always has been, profit over product (and people).
- SilverElfin 1y agoBut how can the product exist if people don’t make enough profit? Why would they take on the risk and stress of building a business instead of just taking another job.
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- josefritzishere 1y agoThis is patently illegal but the current administration doesnt care about that.
- count 1y agoShortening “Norfolk Southern” to “Norfolk” makes this confusing to read. Norfolk is a city (and former HQ of Norfolk Southern). “Union” isn’t shortened the same… Also, railroads are already monopoly, it’s not like anyone can lay down new tracks, and operators aren’t required to allow 3rd parties on their networks…
- infecto 1y agoOnly confusing if you think it’s more likely that a railroad company is buying a town instead of another large railroad company… They may be a monopoly in their regions but this would be the first time in a long while we had the same name coast to coast.
- dowager_dan99 1y agoyes, railways don't buy towns, they build them from scratch!
- pixelpoet 1y agoDon't forget the famous Norfolk island, whose TLD is .nf: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norfolk_Island https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norfolk_Island The fastest Mandelbrot rendering algorithm, using a perturbation method, was developed by a guy from there.
- drcongo 1y agoBelieve me, it's a lot more confusing to british people.
- CGMthrowaway 1y agoUsed to be called Norfolk & Petersburg. Now it's two city names. Does that make it less confusing?
- a_shovel 1y agoUnder normal circumstances, a merger between railroad giants would be so outlandish that they would never consider publishing an announcement like this. Anything is possible these days, it seems.
- AnimalMuppet 1y agoNo, why? Is it (much) more outlandish than the merger that created BNSF? Is it much more outlandish than CP and KCS? What makes this more outlandish than the previous mega-mergers?
- vonneumannstan 1y agoSeems to be ~20x the value of the BNSF merger(~10x accounting for inflation). So yeah its pretty outlandish?
- AnimalMuppet 1y agoOK, but why does that make it "outlandish", as opposed to just "really big"? It's smaller than Pfizer buying Warner-Lambert in 1999. It's smaller (at least inflation adjusted) than Exxon-Mobil or Citicorp-Travelers. It's a lot smaller than AOL-Time Warner in 2000. It's smaller than Dow-duPont in 2015. Why is it outlandish? Because it involves railroads?
- lelandbatey 1y agoIn short, "yes, because it's railroads". There's not much else that requires so much public resources (land) and capital; yet for that railroads deliver a broad capability (hyper thermodynamically efficient over land transport) that is not replicable via any other technology or practice. If we don't develop/improve that capability, we give up a tremendous amount of ability. If we let it consolidate and then atrophy, we regress to a huge degree. It'd be like privatizing the roads and then allowing the closure of the small farm roads because they're "not profitable". It'd be massively short sighted and would cause problems for decades, maybe over a century as we sort things out and get back on track. It's what we're in the middle of with railroads.
- m0llusk 1y agoUS rail currently operates with shocking rates of derailment causing toxic releases and critically strained labor relations. There is business potential in this deal, but also a strong likelihood of continued disintegration.
- trollbridge 1y agoBoth workforces are union and I doubt employees will see much benefit from this. I would expect to see the unions block this unless they get major concessions.
- yesbut 1y agoCool, more railroad monopolies, yay.
- gaws 1y agoWhat century are we in?
- 1970-01-01 1y agoIf they get the Electric Company and Water Works it's likely bankruptcy for us. Put more houses on Oriental Avenue and hope they land there next turn.
- pstuart 1y agoNationalize the rails. Let companies compete on their rolling stock.
- jabl 1y agoThere are some good theoretical arguments for such a structure, but OTOH experience trying to apply it on railroads hasn't been exactly positive. UK probably being the prominent example.
- pstuart 1y agoObviously it would be impossible in today's political climate, but I believe it would be a solvable problem. Ensuring full utilization of Positive Train Control could allow a lot more traffic (including a lot more passenger rail, and make it a first class citizen of the rails) -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_train_control https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_train_control
- Simulacra 1y agoBut don't they dare repair and replace tracks, signals, and cars..but, no.