According to Wedbush, following President-elect Donald Trump's declaration of Andrew Ferguson as the new chair of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the tech space is expected to see an increase in mergers and acquisitions. Ferguson will succeed Lina Khan, whose tenure was distinguished by a strong concentration on tech industry regulation.
Wedbush Securities claims that Ferguson's leadership is expected to bring in a more innovative approach, maybe undoing regulations judged as too restrictive under Khan. Analysts say this change comes at a pivotal point in the competition to control artificial intelligence, orienting big companies like Microsoft (MSFT, Financial), Amazon (AMZN, Financial), Oracle (ORCL, Financial), Alphabet (GOOG, GOOGL), and Tesla (TSLA, Financial) toward strategic acquisitions.
The expected regulation reforms are seen as a positive for the industry since they would help IT giants strengthen their competitive positions and lower the possibility of forced breakups. Under Ferguson's pro-business approach, industry analysts predict these businesses might widen their technological lead
through more deal activity as artificial intelligence research accelerates.
Early Wednesday, Microsoft's shares surged over 0.5% in line with the general IT industry optimism.
