While the United States government's Federal Trade Commission (hereon referred to as the FTC) has agreed for staff to engage in settlement negotiations with Microsoft regarding its ongoing efforts to purchase Activision Blizzard, "there are no substantive discussions" between the two parties being conducted "at this time."
That's coming from FTC lawyer James Weingarten, who took part in a pretrial hearing on Tuesday to discuss Microsoft's proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard for a record-breaking $69bn.
Back in December, the FTC revealed its intention to block Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard, claiming should the deal be allowed to proceed, it would enable the company to suppress its fellow games industry competition.