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"The CMA is effectively rewarding PlayStation and Sony who wants to maintain the status quo of expensive console and full price games," said Gareth Sutcliffe, at Enders Analysis. He said Microsoft was being ‘punished for its poor handling of regulator concerns’ and would now need to a new plan to achieve a merger.

Rejection could imperil the position of Phil Spencer, the head of Microsoft’s gaming division who, alongside Smith, was the main driving force behind efforts to get regulatory approval, he said. "It’s hard to see how Spencer could stay if this fails. He was a big part of the problem."

Gareth Sutcliffe, at Enders Analysis, a media research group, said: “The fact that the cloud gaming market is so nascent makes the CMA’s decision seem querulous. This decision is more a clear reflection of the CMA’s lack of trust in Microsoft and the dismissive way that Microsoft has responded to regulator concerns.”

Claire Enders, an analyst who has followed Murdoch’s businesses for decades, described Carlson’s removal as “typical” for the media scion whose unsentimental nature helped inspire the character of Logan Roy in HBO’s Succession.

“It’s a clean-up operation, a typical Murdoch move,” said Enders. “Someone has to carry the can.”

Leading US media commentator Alice Enders, director of research at analysis group Enders, believes Mr Tucker’s departure could point to Fox showing it will “clean up its act”.

“Fox News will have to be more vigilant about what its hosts opine about,” said Ms Enders. “Tucker was also close to Trump.”

“I think it could be an editorial decision by Fox to tack away from a host that is so pro-Trump,” says Alice Enders at Enders Analysis.

She added “All media organisations in the US are going to have to clean up their act and impose some discipline – they can’t use the First Amendment as a blanket cloak for everything that’s said by their presenters."

The channel is still facing a separate $2.7bn lawsuit from Dominion’s rival Smartmatic as well as a case brought by a shareholder.

“I think it could well be that there is some move to gather the flock, the employees, the hosts and so on together and just say: ‘Look, there are guidelines you’re just going to have to observe.’”