InBev said yesterday it has agreed to sell the US brewing and distribution rights to its Canadian Labatt beer in order to win approval from the US Department of Justice for its $52bn takeover of Anheuser-Busch, the brewer of Budweiser.

Now that the deal, which will create the world's largest brewer and which Anheuser initially opposed, has been cleared by Anheuser shareholders and US antitrust regulators, the market's focus will lie squarely on whether it will close by the end of the year as targeted, despite the difficult financing environment.