OPINION OF THE COURT
In this antitrust suit a methanol producer challenges a competitor’s acquisition of another corporation. The merger led to cancellation of the acquired company's plans to produce methanol by a new process, preceded by large scale purchases to stimulate the market before beginning production. We conclude that the plaintiffs’ alleged loss of anticipated sales resulting from that expected increase of market activity does not constitute antitrust injury. We determine further that the plaintiffs’ collateral loss of sales to the acquired company in the circumstances amounts to only a de minim-is foreclosure, and does not constitute antitrust injury. Consequently, we will affirm the district court’s entry of summary judgment in favor of defendant.
In 1981, E.I. Du Pont de Nemours and Company acquired Conoco Inc., in a transaction of approximately 7.8 billion dollars. Plaintiffs contend that the merger violated § 7 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S.C. § 18, because it “may substantially lessen competition” in the United States market for methanol. Plaintiffs seek an order for divestiture as well as money damages of 98.5 million Canadian dollars for lost profits and interest and 158 million Canadian dollars for reduced value of the plaintiffs' business.
Although Du Pont and Conoco produce a variety of products, this litigation focuses on the methanol-producing and methanol-consuming aspects of their operations. Methanol is a chemical used in the manufacture of such products as formaldehyde, plywood, particle board, various plastics, and many others. Methanol can also be used as a fuel both in its pure form and as an additive to gasoline. It is viewed as a successor to gasoline in motor vehicles, to natural gas and petroleum in utility generators, and to petroleum in various chemical uses.
Plaintiffs are Alberta Gas Chemicals, Ltd., a Canadian natural gas producer, and its New Jersey subsidiary, Alberta Gas Chemicals, Inc. (collectively “Alberta”). Alberta produces methanol from its natural gas holdings in Canada and boasts the largest source of the product in that country. In the highly concentrated United States “merchant market,” that is, the market for methanol not used by the producing company for internal manufacturing, Alberta’s sales accounted for about 7% in 1981.
*1237Defendant Du Pont was the largest producer of methanol in the United States in 1981, recording sales of about 30% of the merchant market. In that year, Du Pont devoted about half of its production to internal operations. Du Pont and the second largest producer together controlled about 50% of the market, and the four largest companies accounted for more than 70%.
At the time of the acquisition, Conoco was an international energy company owning the largest coal reserves in the United States. It did not produce methanol, but in 1980 purchased roughly nine million gallons for use in its chemical and plastic manufacturing plants in New Jersey and Louisiana. Its purchases represented approximately 1.8% of total merchant market sales in the United States.
Although methanol is generally manufactured from natural gas, studies have demonstrated the potential for using coal as a source through a gasification and liquefaction process. During the 1970s and early 1980s when crude oil prices rose rapidly, projects that experimented with coal to produce synthetic fuels grew commercially attractive. With governmental encouragement, many corporations explored coal gasification and, by mid-1981, at least sixteen coal-to-methanol projects were active.
Before the merger, Conoco had been studying plans to construct a large coal gasification facility in the United States. Among other uses, the company considered blending methanol with gasoline to produce gasohol, a fuel for motor vehicles that Conoco would market through its existing service stations, particularly on the west coast.
After the merger, Conoco cancelled the coal gasification project. The company also sold its chemical plant in Louisiana and dismantled the one in New Jersey. By 1984, Conoco’s methanol purchases were comparatively minimal.
Because of the lead time necessary for construction, Conoco’s first methanol plant was not likely to have begun operations until the late 1980s. In order to have a market in place when manufacture began, Alberta asserts that Conoco planned to purchase large quantities of methanol from a number of producers in the interim. Conoco would then sell this methanol on the merchant market to stimulate additional demand.
Alberta estimates that Conoco would have purchased at least one hundred million gallons of methanol per year in the interim before its own production facilities became operational. Alberta would have supplied some of this quantity, it says, and to that extent would benefit directly. It would profit indirectly through the increased price for methanol brought about by the large demand created by Conoco’s purchases. These elements make up Alberta’s first or “demand creation” claim.
Alberta’s second claim is based on the premise that it would have sold methanol to Conoco for its chemical and plastic plants in New Jersey and Louisiana. After the merger, Conoco filled some of its needs through Du Pont and other companies, but none through Alberta. Alberta claims damages for a loss of sales to Conoco which, it is alleged, resulted from the merger.
After the acquisition, Du Pont temporarily closed one of its two methanol-producing plants and, although it no longer predominates in the “merchant market,” still possesses substantial market power. The price of methanol has declined substantially since the early 1980s, and there is now an oversupply in the world market. Du Pont insists that Conoco did not proceed with coal gasification plans because of the falling price of oil and observes that other companies also abandoned their projects for the same reason.
Conoco’s consumption of methanol fell after the merger to about 400,000 gallons in 1985, none of which Du Pont supplied. Conoco had purchased some methanol from Alberta in the late 1970s, but was not a customer of plaintiffs at the time of Du Pont’s acquisition.
Alberta filed suit on September 25, 1981, in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey. The complaint asked for equitable relief, but Alberta did *1238not seek a preliminary injunction. The merger became effective on September 30, 1981. After the parties had conducted extensive discovery, the district court granted summary judgment in favor of Du Pont on Alberta’s horizontal or “demand creation” claim and, at a later date, on the “vertical” count as well.
The court assumed for purposes of summary judgment that Du Pont’s acquisition of Conoco violated § 7 of the Clayton Act1 and that Alberta had suffered the losses it claimed. In addition, the court also accepted Alberta’s theory that potential competition between Du Pont and Conoco had been or would be eliminated because of cancellation of the coal gasification project. Rejecting Alberta’s arguments, the district court stated that the absence of a projected increase in industry demand was not identical to a lessening of competition. There being no antitrust injury in the view of the court, it denied Alberta’s demand creation claim.
The district court distinguished Alberta's second or “vertical” claim — that for losses of sales to Conoco’s chemical plants. Relying on Brown Shoe Co. v. United States, 370 U.S. 294, 328, 82 S.Ct. 1502, 1525, 8 L.Ed.2d 510 (1962), the court reasoned that foreclosing competitors from a segment of the market would make defendant liable for losses traceable to that action. Because Conoco had ceased its chemical manufacturing operations . by 1984, however, the court ruled that Alberta could not establish any losses after that point.
In addition, the court observed that Alberta had not submitted any breakdown of the losses suffered between the acquisition in 1981 and Conoco’s withdrawal from the plastic and chemical manufacturing fields in 1984. Based on this gap in proof, the court concluded that Alberta had failed to meet its burden on damages. Moreover, the court stated that its decision was compelled because “even before the merger Conoco had no plans to purchase methanol from Alberta.”
Finally, the court denied Alberta’s claim for an injunction. The court noted that because the antitrust injury requirement applies to claims for equitable relief, Alberta’s failure to demonstrate antitrust injury in its damage claims was fatal to its prayer for divestiture.
On appeal, Alberta contends that it would prove its vertical claim at trial by showing prospects of sales to Conoco and argues that summary judgment was inappropriate to resolve this issue of material fact. Alberta asserts, in addition, that the district court erred in evaluating the vertical claim by relying on Du Pont’s post-acquisition activity. That conduct, Alberta says, is self-serving and is merely temporary forbearance limited to the duration of the current litigation.
As to the demand creation claim, Alberta argues that in failing to find antitrust injury, the district court erred because it did not recognize that the damages flow directly from “either ... the [antitrust] violation or ... anticompetitive [acts] made possible by the violation.” Brief for appellants at 27 (quoting Brunswick Corp. v. Pueblo Bowl-O-Mat, Inc., 429 U.S. 477, 489, 97 S.Ct. 690, 697, 50 L.Ed.2d 701 (1977)).
I.
Summary judgment can be granted only if no genuine issue of material fact exists. Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c); Goodman v. Mead Johnson & Co., 534 F.2d 566, 573 (3d Cir. 1976), cert. denied, 429 U.S. 1038, 97 S.Ct. 732, 50 L.Ed.2d 748 (1977). An issue is “genuine” only if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could find for the non-moving party. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 2510, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). At the summary judgment stage, “the judge’s function is not himself to weigh the evidence and de*1239termine the truth of the matter but to determine whether there is a genuine issue for trial.” Id. at 2511. On review of a grant of summary judgment, this court applies the same test that the district court should have adopted. Marek v. Marpan Two, Inc., 817 F.2d 242 (3d Cir.1987).
II.
It is important to place this litigation in its proper setting. The district court assumed, arguendo, that § 7 had been violated. If the government were prosecuting, sanctions against defendant should follow. Otherwise, public policy against improper mergers as expressed in the antitrust laws would not be realized.2
This is not, however, a suit instituted by the government for the benefit of society as a whole, but a claim brought by a private litigant — a competitor of defendant. To supplement enforcement of the antitrust laws, Congress has created private causes of action to recover treble damages and obtain equitable relief. See 15 U.S.C. §§ 15, 26. This additional avenue of enforcement, however, is not open to all who might' be interested in punishing the wrongdoer or who might have suffered some peripheral loss. In an effort to keep private enforcement within reasonable bounds, the courts have imposed limitations designed to discourage plaintiffs other than those most apt to carry out the purposes of the statutes.
Courts have carefully scrutinized enforcement efforts by competitors because their interests are not necessarily congruent with the consumer’s stake in competition. Mergers that promote efficiency and lower prices in the marketplace, for example, may cause economic loss to competitors.
Conduct that harms competitors may benefit consumers — a result the antitrust laws were not intended to penalize. “When the plaintiff is a poor champion of consumers, a court must be especially careful not to grant relief that may undercut the proper functions of antitrust.” Ball Memorial Hosp., Inc. v. Mutual Hosp. Ins., Inc., 784 F.2d 1325, 1334 (7th Cir.1986); see Cargill, Inc. v. Monfort of Colo., Inc., - U.S. -, 107 S.Ct. 484, 493, 93 L.Ed.2d 427 (1986) (competitor’s loss of profits due to increased price competition following a merger does not constitute a threat of antitrust injury)3; see also Hovenkamp, Merger Actions for Damages, 35 Hastings L.Rev. 937, 956 (1984) (private plaintiffs’ injuries are as likely to be caused by the efficiency aspects of mergers as by their market power effects); Baumol & Ordover, Use Of Antitrust To Subvert Competition, 28 J.L. & Econ. 247 (1985).
One restriction on private enforcement the courts have imposed is the doctrine of standing. A malleable concept not easily defined, antitrust standing has been construed in a variety of ways and settings. The struggle to articulate a precise formulation is a continuing one because success has proved elusive.
At times, the label “standing” has caused confusion when used in the antitrust context as opposed to the constitutional sense. The Supreme Court has noted that “[h]arm to the antitrust plaintiff is sufficient to satisfy the constitutional standing requirement of injury in fact, but the court must make a further determination whether the plaintiff is a proper party to bring a private antitrust action.” Associated Gen. Contractors of Cal., Inc. v. California State Council of Carpenters, 459 U.S. 519, 535 n. 31, 103 S.Ct. 897, 907, 74 L.Ed.2d 723 (1983).
*1240As the Court said, it is not enough that the complaint alleges “a causal connection between an antitrust violation and harm to the [plaintiff]____ [T]he mere fact that the claim is literally encompassed by the Clayton Act does not end the inquiry.” Id. at 537, 103 S.Ct. at 908. Among the factors that must be weighed in determining antitrust standing are the directness or indirectness of the injury, the court’s ability to keep trial of the claim within the judicially manageable limits, and the nature of the injury (i.e., is it of the type that the antitrust laws were meant to prevent). Id. at 538-45, 103 S.Ct. at 908-12. See Merican, Inc. v. Caterpillar Tractor Co., 713 F.2d 958, 964-65 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, 465 U.S. 1024, 104 S.Ct. 1278, 79 L.Ed.2d 682 (1983). See also Illinois Brick Co. v. Illinois, 431 U.S. 720, 745, 97 S.Ct. 2061, 2074, 52 L.Ed.2d 707 (1977); Hawaii v. Standard Oil Co. of Cal., 405 U.S. 251, 264, 92 S.Ct. 885, 892, 31 L.Ed.2d 184 (1972).
The “nature of the injury” factor determines whether the plaintiff has suffered “antitrust injury.” This term was the focus of discussion in Brunswick Corp. v. Pueblo Bowl-O-Mat, Inc., 429 U.S. 477, 97 S.Ct. 690, 50 L.Ed.2d 701. There, the Court stated that to recover treble damages for a § 7 violation, plaintiffs must prove more than harm causally linked to an illegal presence in the market. Rather, they must establish antitrust injury — “injury of the type the antitrust laws were intended to prevent and that flows from that which makes defendants' acts unlawful.” Id. at 489, 97 S.Ct. at 697. The harm “should reflect the anticompetitive effect either of the violation or of anticompetitive acts made possible by the violation. It should, in short, be ‘the type of loss that the claimed violations ... would be likely to cause.’ ” Id. (quoting Zenith Radio Corp. v. Hazeltine Research, Inc., 395 U.S. 100, 125, 89 S.Ct. 1562, 1577, 23 L.Ed.2d 129 (1969)); see also Blue Shield of Va. v. McCready, 457 U.S. 465, 482-83, 102 S.Ct. 2540, 2550, 73 L.Ed.2d 149 (1982); Associated Gen. Contractors, 459 U.S. at 538-40, 103 S.Ct. at 908-09.
Expanding on that notion, in Cargill, the Court held that a private plaintiff seeking an injunction under § 16 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S.C. § 26, must show a threat of antitrust injury. See also Pennsylvania Dental Ass’n v. Medical Serv. Ass’n of Pa., 815 F.2d 270, 275 (3d Cir.1987); Schoenkopf v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 637 F.2d 205, 210-11 (3d Cir.1980).
A showing of antitrust injury is necessary but not always sufficient to establish antitrust standing. A party may have suffered antitrust injury yet not be considered a proper plaintiff for other reasons. See Cargill, 107 S.Ct. at 489-90 & nn. 5, 6. It has been suggested that although standing is closely related to antitrust injury, the two concepts are distinct. Once antitrust injury has been demonstrated by a causal relationship between the harm and the challenged aspect of the alleged violation, standing analysis is employed to search for the most effective plaintiff from among those who have suffered loss. See Cargill, 107 S.Ct. at 490 n. 6; Schoenkopf, 637 F.2d at 210; see also Page, The Scope of Liability for Antitrust Violations, 37 Stan.L.Rev. 1445, 1484 (1985). However, in the sense that plaintiffs who sustain no antitrust injury may not recover, they may be loosely said to lack standing. Some courts and commentators thus have treated Brunswick as a standing case, although its concerns actually centered on antitrust injury.
Cargill emphasized the necessity for scrutinizing the antitrust injury factor. There, the Court wrote that the antitrust laws protect business against “the loss of profits from practices forbidden by the antitrust laws____ [Competition for increased market share[ ] is not activity forbidden by the antitrust laws.” 107 S.Ct. at 492. In short, Clayton Act deterrence through compensatory provisions is aimed toward the directly harmful effects of an antitrust transgression. The statutory sanctions do not constitute a broad restitutionary scheme for injuries not closely related to the violation but caused by other effects, desirable or not, of the illegal conduct. Seaboard Supply Co. v. Congoleum Corp., 770 F.2d 367, 372 (3d Cir.1985); Sit- *1241 kin Smelting & Refining Co. v. FMC Corp., 575 F.2d 440, 447-48 (3d Cir.), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 866, 99 S.Ct. 191, 58 L.Ed.2d 176 (1978). Mindful that antitrust law aims to protect competition, not competitors, we must analyze the antitrust injury question from the viewpoint of the consumer. Brown Shoe Co. v. United States, 370 U.S. 294, 320, 82 S.Ct. 1502, 1521, 8 L.Ed.2d 510 (1962).
The issue before us is whether Alberta has asserted losses which may properly be called antitrust injury. Concerns about “standing” in this case must be read in that light.
III.
As noted above, Alberta’s first, or horizontal, claim seeks damages for lost sales allegedly caused by the termination of Conoco’s plans to produce and build demand for methanol as a fuel. The acquisition, resulting in cancellation of the coal gasification project, according to Alberta, violated § 7 because Du Pont eliminated Conoco as a substantial methanol producing competitor. That action also ended Conoco’s plans to spur demand for methanol as fuel. As a result, Alberta asserts that it lost sales and profits when “competition for the sale of hundreds of millions of gallons of additional methanol [to Conoco to build interim demand] was eliminated.” Brief for appellants at 28.
The district court found that injury from this “demand creation” claim “bears absolutely no relationship to the aspect of the merger which is said to make it illegal under § 7, that is, that it lessens competition in the methanol industry.” The court noted that “Alberta Gas alleges no damages as a result of the elimination of potential competition between Du Pont and Conoco. Instead, the damages alleged are purely the result of the failure of demand to rise____ No damages can possibly be awarded Alberta Gas on this theory.”
Alberta contends that, in reaching this conclusion, the district court misapplied Brunswick. We do not agree.
For purposes of this discussion, we will assume, as did the district court, that the acquisition is illegal because it enabled Du Pont to bar Conoco from entering the methanol-producing industry as an independent competitor.4 In this setting, the concern of the antitrust laws and consumers is the loss of competition between Du Pont and Conoco after the latter’s entry into the market as a producer. See Brown Shoe, 370 U.S. at 335, 82 S.Ct. at 1529 (validity of horizontal merger depends on certain factors, including whether it will absorb or insulate competitors, thereby lessening competition between the acquiring and acquired companies).
But Alberta’s horizontal injuries do not flow “from that which makes the defendants’ acts unlawful.” Brunswick, 429 U.S. at 489, 97 S.Ct. at 697. Alberta’s alleged losses were neither connected with, nor resulted from, Du Pont’s market power in the methanol-producing industry. That is clear because the same harm would have occurred had any acquirer decided to curtail Conoco’s production and marketing plans. For example, a non-methanol producing company, whose merger would not pose antitrust problems, might have been dissuaded from entering the market because of the costs of coal gasification or the depressed prices of oil and natural gas, the more traditional energy sources. That *1242Du Pont might have had an additional reason — a desire not to increase its total production of methanol — does not change the nature of the effect of Du Pont’s decision on Alberta. Alberta, as a competitor, is in no position to claim compensable injury from Du Pont’s elimination of a potential increase in output. See Matsushita Elec. Ind. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 106 S.Ct. 1348, 1354, 89 L.Ed.2d 538 (1986) (competitors cannot recover antitrust damages for a conspiracy to impose non-price restraints that have the effect of either raising market price or limiting output); Page, supra, 37 Stan.L.Rev. at 1471 (competitors suffer no antitrust injury from horizontal merger resulting in higher prices).
Further, Conoco’s status as a potential competitor in the methanol merchant market is irrelevant to Alberta’s theory of injury. Alberta’s alleged injuries flow not from the elimination of Conoco as a potential competitor, but from the loss of Conoco as a future consumer of methanol.5 While in this case there may be some connection between Conoco’s plan to become a competitor and its plan to consume more methanol in the future, the former plan is really only coincidental to the harm which Alberta supposedly sustained. In a challenge to a horizontal merger, a private plaintiff must show that it was injured because the acquiring and the acquired firms are competitors in a field of commerce. It is not enough to demonstrate that, by happenstance, the merging firms are competitors or potential competitors.
In Brunswick, bowling centers in three distinct markets contended that the wealthy defendant’s acquisition of some of their competitors violated § 7. The Court found no antitrust injury because plaintiffs “would have suffered the identical ‘loss’— but no compensable injury — had the acquired centers instead obtained refinancing or been purchased by ‘shallow pocket’ parents.” 429 U.S. at 487, 97 S.Ct. at 697. Similarly, because Alberta’s injuries would have occurred absent a violation of § 7, they do not flow from the anticompetitive effects of the merger.
Moreover, the Du Pont-Conoco merger would not necessarily lead to the loss of profits Alberta claims. Consistent with a finding that the acquisition violated § 7, Du Pont could have chosen to go forward with a coal-based strategy, providing Alberta with its anticipated sales and profits. In Brunswick, the Court noted that if Brunswick “acquired thriving bowling centers — acquisitions at least as violative of § 7 as the instant acquisitions — respondents would not have lost any income that they otherwise would have received.” Id. at 487 n. 12, 97 S.Ct. at 697 n. 12.
Similarly, if in the future Du Pont proceeds with coal gasification procedures, a development Alberta maintains will occur, the same market effects may well result. Because Alberta’s injuries were not proximately caused by the anticompetitive effects of the Du Pont-Conoco merger, they do not flow from the alleged § 7 violation. See Associated Gen. Contractors, 459 U.S. at 535-36, 103 S.Ct. at 907; Gregory Marketing Corp. v. Wakefern Food Corp., 787 F.2d 92, 94, 96 (3d Cir.) (broker’s injuries from reduced commissions not proximately caused by the anticompetitive nature of a pricing agreement because the broker’s profits “would not necessarily be reduced by diminished competition”), cert. denied, - U.S. -, 107 S.Ct. 87, 93 L.Ed.2d 40 (1986).
Finally, Alberta’s horizontal losses are not injury of the type the antitrust laws were intended to prevent. The Brunswick plaintiffs complained that in acquiring each failing bowling center, defendant deprived them of the profits plaintiffs would have realized from increased market concentration when the center went bankrupt. The *1243Court concluded that “it is far from clear that the loss of windfall profits that would have accrued had the acquired centers failed even constitutes ‘injury’ within the meaning of § 4. And it is quite clear that if respondents were injured, it was not ‘by reason of anything forbidden in the antitrust laws.’ ” 429 U.S. at 488, 97 S.Ct. at 697.
In this case, Alberta seeks damages from Du Pont’s abandonment of Conoco’s strategy to increase demand and price for methanol. As in Brunswick, Alberta contends, not that its position worsened as a result of the acquisition, but rather that it was denied sales and profits from an increase in demand — essentially windfall profits. The antitrust laws, however, do not award damages or equitable relief for losses stemming from the failure of a competitor to bring about an increase in demand and price. Matsushita, 106 S.Ct. at 1354; see also Areeda, Antitrust Violations Without Damage Recoveries, 89 Harv.L.Rev. 1127, 1134 (1976) (In Brunswick, “the plaintiff never established that its position had worsened — it argued only that without the merger it would have been better off due to the failure of its competitors. It would be stretching beyond credibility the words ‘injur[y] in business or property’ to include within their terms this kind of disappointed expectation of windfall profit.”).
The district court accurately described Alberta’s claim as one not for a reduction of its existing sales base but the denial of an increase. Significantly, cancellation of the gasification project did not cause any decrease in the supply of methanol in the marketplace; consequently, the merger did not diminish the amount available to consumers. Alberta’s position can be sustained only if the antitrust laws impose an affirmative duty on a producer to expand markets in addition to the prohibitions against undertaking anticompetitive measures to reduce them. Alberta cites no authority for such a construction of the antitrust laws.
From the consumer’s standpoint, the development that Alberta anticipated and the basis for its claim — an increase in methanol price — would prove distinctly disadvantageous. It is unavailing to argue that Du Pont’s failure to bring about an increase in the price of methanol injured Alberta in a manner that the antitrust laws were intended to compensate. See Cargill, 107 S.Ct. at 492 (antitrust laws intended to protect price competition); Arthur S. Langenderfer, Inc. v. S.E. Johnson Co., 729 F.2d 1050 (6th Cir.), (“[i]t is in the interest of competition to permit dominant firms to engage in vigorous competition, including price competition”), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 1036, 105 S.Ct. 510, 83 L.Ed.2d 401 (1984).
We are struck, moreover, with the fact that the presence of Conoco as a competítor in the marketplace would not serve Alberta’s self-interest in the long run. It is curious that Alberta would assert a loss by conduct of Du Pont which, if Alberta is to be credited, reduced the number of suppliers in the marketplace. If that action helps Du Pont as a producer, it inevitably aids Alberta as well as every other producer.6 See generally P. Areeda & D. Turner, Antitrust Law ¶ 335.2f, at 239 (1986 Supp.) (joint venture creating disincentive for a foreign producer to commence independent manufacturing operations in the United States would result in reduced competition, which would only benefit a competitor in the American market).
In sum, because Alberta has not asserted antitrust injury from the horizontal aspects of the merger, the district court did not err in granting summary judgment for Du Pont on those claims.
IV.
In analyzing Alberta’s vertical injuries, that is, loss of methanol sales to Conoco for its plastic and chemical plants, the district court said that “there is no possibility that Alberta Gas will be able to show damages from any lost sales due to the merger.” The court found that by July 1984, Du Pont *1244had divested or shut down Conoco’s methanol-consuming operations. The district court also determined that Conoco had no plans before the merger to purchase Alberta’s methanol from 1981 to 1984. Therefore, the court concluded that Alberta failed to establish a basis for damages.
Alberta now contends that, with respect to the vertical claim, it can prove at trial it would have sold methanol to Conoco and, therefore, the district court erred in making factual determinations which are subject to substantial dispute. We need not resolve this point because we will affirm on another ground. See Fairview Township v. EPA, 773 F.2d 517, 525 n. 15 (3d Cir.1985) (this court may affirm the district court on any basis finding support in the record).
In essence, Alberta seeks compensation for lost sales resulting from Du Pont-Conoco self-dealing after the merger. The district court noted that in 1980, the year before the merger, Conoco purchased 8.9 million gallons of methanol representing approximately 1.8% of total merchant methanol market sales. Alberta claims injury because Du Pont, and not Alberta, supplied the post-merger methanol requirements for Conoco’s New Jersey and Louisiana plants.
In United States v. General Dynamics Corp., 415 U.S. 486, 504, 94 S.Ct. 1186, 1197, 39 L.Ed.2d 530 (1974), the Court commented that the probative value of “postacquisition evidence tending to diminish the probability or impact of anticompetitive effects” in a § 7 case is “extremely limited.” The need for such a limitation is obvious. “If a demonstration that no anticompetitive effects had occurred at the time of trial or of judgment constituted a permissible defense to a § 7 divestiture suit, violators could stave off such actions merely by refraining from aggressive or anticompetitive behavior when such a suit was threatened or pending.” Id. at 504-05, 94 S.Ct. at 1197.
The Court’s remarks are pertinent to our present antitrust injury inquiry. To avoid the questionable validity of some postacquisition evidence tending to minimize the future anticompetitive effects of the Du Pont-Conoco merger, we generally will view the acquisition at the time of its occurrence and accept the facts as Alberta asserts them.
Early in the litigation, the district court denied Du Pont’s motion to dismiss based on allegations that Du Pont-Conoco self-dealing following the merger foreclosed 3% of the market. As discovery progressed, it became apparent that Conoco’s purchases for its chemical plants equalled substantially less than 3% of the merchant market. Although recognizing that foreclosure per se did not constitute a violation of § 7, the court never reexamined the extent to which the market had been affected by the merger, but instead chose to grant judgment on Alberta’s failure to prove fact of injury.
Clearly, de minimis foreclosure of a market is not an antitrust dereliction in itself. See Brown Shoe, 370 U.S. at 329, 82 S.Ct. at 1526. Indeed, respected scholars question the anticompetitive effects of vertical mergers in general. As one commentator phrases it: “Foreclosure does not, however, reflect an actual reduction in competition in any meaningful sense.” Page, Antitrust Damages and Economic Efficiency: An Approach to Antitrust Injury, 47 U.Chi.L.Rev. 467, 495 (1980); see also 4 P. Areeda & D. Turner, supra ¶ 1004, at 211 (foreclosure argument has grave weaknesses; only where foreclosures reach monopolistic proportions — or threaten to do so — does a vertical merger become troublesome); R. Bork, The Antitrust Paradox 226, 237 (1978) (“Antitrust’s concern with vertical mergers is mistaken. Vertical mergers are means of creating efficiency, not of injuring competition____ [The] foreclosure theory is not merely wrong, it is irrelevant.”); Hovenkamp, supra, 35 Hastings L.J. at 961 (of all mergers, vertical acquisitions are the most likely to produce efficiencies and the least likely to enhance the market power of the merging firms).
A vertically integrated firm seeking to increase profits will engage in self-dealing if the supplying division’s output cannot be more profitably sold elsewhere, or is not *1245more costly or inferior than the product of outside suppliers. See 4 P. Areeda & D. Turner, supra, ¶ 1004, at 222; R Bork, supra at 227-28; Hovenkamp, supra, 35 Hastings L.J. at 962. Because of post-merger efficiencies allowing it to purchase the acquiring company’s output at a better price than in the marketplace, the acquired company’s purchasing costs would fall — a procompetitive benefit capable of being passed on via lower prices for its products. Thus, in this scenario, post-merger self-dealing could result in efficiencies reflected in lower prices to the ultimate consumer.
Injuries to competitors of this nature should not be compensable under the antitrust law because they do not flow from the anticompetitive effects of a merger. Far from being caused by any post-merger market power, the competitor’s losses would spring from the efficient aspects of the merger. See Car Carriers, Inc. v. Ford Motor Co., 561 F.Supp. 885, 887-88 (N.D.Ill.1983) (conspiracy to stop dealing with plaintiff motivated by “Ford’s desire to replace high-priced suppliers (plaintiffs) with a low-priced one”; losses flowing from termination are not the type of anti-competitive injury the antitrust laws were intended to forestall), aff'd, 745 F.2d 1101 (7th Cir.1984), cert. denied, 470 U.S. 1054, 105 S.Ct. 1758, 84 L.Ed.2d 821 (1985); Bayou Bottling, Inc. v. Dr. Pepper Co., 725 F.2d 300 (5th Cir.) (franchisor’s influencing of soft drink franchisee to assign franchise to firm other than plaintiff did not cause antitrust injury), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 833, 105 S.Ct. 123, 83 L.Ed.2d 65 (1984).
Nor is it helpful to characterize Du Pont’s actions as designed to eliminate potential consumers for Alberta’s methanol. From this perspective, Du Pont’s “predatory” conduct could be viewed as an attempt to decrease the available outlets for Alberta’s methanol in an effort to drive it from the methanol-producing market. Serious flaws exist with this theory, however, because Alberta has not proffered evidence that it will be forced from the merchant market as a result of Du Pont’s cancellation of Conoco’s methanol purchases there. See Cargill, 107 S.Ct. at 493; Matsushita, 106 S.Ct. at 1355 n. 8. Thus, Alberta cannot rely on quasi-“predatory” activities to establish antitrust injury under Brunswick. See generally R. Bork, supra, at 232 (predation through vertical merger is extremely unlikely). As the district court observed, Conoco’s purchases in the merchant market in 1980 amounted to only 1.8% of sales in the United States. That percentage in itself is de minimis. The amount of the foreclosure is cut in half when one considers that in 1980 Du Pont sold Conoco 46% of its methanol consumption. In reality, the merger foreclosed less than 1% of the market.7 See United States v. Hammermill Paper Co., 429 F.Supp. 1271, 1282 (W.D.Pa.1977) (market share represented by the acquiring company’s previous supply to the acquired firm is not part of the foreclosure). In reviewing these statistics we have assumed, arguendo, that Alberta has correctly defined the appropriate market to be the merchant market for methanol in the United States. We observe that Du Pont contends that the proper denominator should include methanol produced for internal operations, a factor which would dramatically reduce the foreclosure.8
Alberta has not alleged that the acquisition was part of a pattern of foreclosures in the methanol-consuming market, nor that the merger triggered a pattern of foreclosures which, in the aggregate, would cause harmful effects. See Brown Shoe, 370 U.S. at 332-33, 82 S.Ct. at 1528. Alberta contends that the methanol indus*1246try as a whole is highly integrated; nevertheless plaintiff competes in the merchant market, where its' losses allegedly occurred.
Since the merger, Alberta has freely sold to the rest of the merchant market and indeed has increased its annual sales in the United States from 38 million gallons in 1980 to 64 million gallons in 1984 and 83 million gallons in 1985.9 The circumstances here differ considerably from Heatransfer Corp. v. Volkswagenwerk, A.G., 553 F.2d 964, 985 (5th Cir.1977), where a vertical merger virtually precluded the plaintiff from selling any of its products.
The case at hand more closely resembles Fruehauf Corp. v. FTC, 603 F.2d 345, 360 (2d Cir.1979), in which the court decided that a vertical integration foreclosing 5.8% of the market did not constitute an antitrust violation. The court of appeals concluded that, as a result of this foreclosure, “there would merely be a realignment of existing market sales without any likelihood of a diminution in competition.” Id. at 360; see also Crane Co. v. Harsco Corp., 509 F.Supp. 115, 125 (D.Del.1981) (vertical acquisition foreclosing 8.8% of market does not substantially lessen competition); Crouse-Hinds Co. v. Internorth, Inc., 518 F.Supp. 416, 431 (N.D.N.Y.1980) (plaintiff must show anticompetitive effect as well as significant market foreclosure in vertical merger case under § 7); United Nuclear Corp. v. Combustion Engineering, Inc., 302 F.Supp. 539, 557 (E.D.Pa.1969) (foreclosures of 5.5% and 19% are “inconclusive” in determining § 7 violation). See generally 2 P. Areeda & D. Turner, supra, ¶ 527a (absent very high market concentration, a vertical merger may simply realign sales patterns between competitors of the merged and merging firms).
Because the district court assumed that a violation of § 7 existed, the posture of the appeal requires us to consider whether foreclosure could be the basis of an infraction here. We conclude that because of its de minimis consequences, the Du Pont acquisition and subsequent foreclosure of Conoco purchases from Alberta does not establish a § 7 violation.10 Therefore, the loss of sales to Conoco flowing from the foreclosure does not satisfy the antitrust injury requirement as announced in Brunswick.
To recover damages in this situation, a private plaintiff must establish foreclosure of a sufficiently large share of the market to violate § 7. Having failed to do that in the present case, Alberta has not established antitrust violation or resulting injury. The fact that Du Pont had a large share in the market before the merger, moreover, does not transform a de minimis foreclosure into antitrust injury any more than Brunswick’s superior financial ability turned its acquisitions into unlawful competition for smaller bowling alleys. See Brunswick, 429 U.S. at 487, 97 S.Ct. at 697. The same harm to Alberta would have ensued if a very small methanol producer had acquired Conoco and imposed total self-dealing.
If the merger were considered unlawful for reasons other than foreclosure of sales, the question then would become whether damages from the foreclosure flowed from the illegal act. Turning once again to Brunswick, we reiterate that plaintiff must establish that its harm was caused by that which makes the action unlawful. Assuming the merger violated the antitrust laws because it concentrated economic power in the production of methanol — as Alberta asserts — any resulting foreclosure from this concentration is but an incident of, and not a result of, the unlawful act. In this in*1247stance, foreclosure losses are not antitrust injury.
For these reasons, we conclude that Alberta has not alleged antitrust injuries from the vertical aspects of the Du Pont-Conoco merger.
Y.
In addition to its treble damage claims, Alberta also seeks an injunction under § 16 of the Clayton Act, 15 U.S.C. § 26, dissolving the Du Pont-Conoco merger. For the reasons that Alberta’s treble damage claims fail under Brunswick, summary judgment is appropriate for Du Pont on Alberta’s claims for injunctive relief as well.
VI.
In sum, because plaintiff has not presented evidence of antitrust injury, we will affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment for Du Pont.11
