Exhibit 611

Recent Acquisitions of U.S. Meat Companies (CRS Report RS22980)

Exhibit 611 · CRS report

Recent Acquisitions of U.S. Meat Companies (CRS Report RS22980)

On October 20, 2008, DOJ and 13 states filed a complaint in U.S. District Court to block the JBS buyout of National Beef Packing Company, citing concerns that it could contribute to higher consumer prices and also lower producer prices.

Records that DOJ and 13 states sued on 20 October 2008 to block JBS from buying National Beef and that DOJ declined to challenge JBS buying Smithfield Beef. ERS (EIB-256, p. 35) records that JBS then dropped the National Beef purchase.

Source: Congressional Research Service (Renee Johnson)
Date: 30 October 2008
Quoted from: Abstract, p. 1
Grade: Primary record
Document: https://stuff.mit.edu/afs/sipb.mit.edu/contrib/wikileaks-crs/wikileaks-crs-reports/RS22980.pdf
Accessed: 2026-11-09
Cited by: Findings citing this exhibit
Note: The copy read is a WikiLeaks mirror of the CRS report.

Cited by

Finding AGR-5.2: Primary record USDA's Economic Research Service attributes the rise in beef and pork packing concentration mostly to larger plants and says mergers played a limited role. ERS also reports that the farm-to-wholesale beef price spread doubled between 2015 and 2019. GAO estimated that fed cattle prices in 2013 to 2015 may have been about 9 percent higher in areas with less packer concentration than in areas with more, and stated that this evidence alone does not imply anticompetitive or improper behavior.