Despite the uncertainty created by the UK’s Brexit vote, the Europe Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region is showing the strongest growth globally in early-stage merger and acquisition (M&A) activity at 13 per cent compared to the same period last year.
This is according to the latest Intralinks Deal Flow Predictor report released by Intralinks Holdings.
It also predicts that the global number of announced deals in FY 2016 will be around 3 per cent higher than FY 2015. This would make 2016 the new peak for the number of global deal announcements, surpassing the previous peak year of 2007.
“EMEA, despite the uncertainty created by the UK’s so-called Brexit vote in a June referendum to leave the EU, is easily the best-performing region this year to date for early-stage M&A activity, driven by continued strong levels of asset disposals in Italy, France, Spain and Germany,” says Philip Whitchelo, vice president of strategy and product marketing at Intralinks. “Even the UK, where forecasts of a sharp economic slowdown in the aftermath of the Brexit vote failed to materialize in Q3, is showing increased levels of early-stage M&A activity (up 8 per cent year-over-year in Q3) after a lacklustre Q2,” he adds.
According to Intralinks, a provider of software and services for managing M&A transactions, EMEA’s strong growth in early-stage M&A activity is across the board, with almost all countries in the region, except the UK, posting double-digit gains in Q3.
Year-over-year growth in early-stage M&A activity continues to be particularly strong in the Nordics (+57 per cent), Benelux (+53 per cent), Italy (+50 per cent), Spain (+34 per cent), France (+13 per cent) and Germany (+10 per cent).
In the UK, early-stage M&A activity has bounced back, increasing by 8 per cent – the UK’s fastest rate of growth so far this year – following the 1 per cent YoY decrease in Q2 2016, when dealmaking activity stalled in the run-up to June’s Brexit referendum.
The report also reveals that EMEA deal pipelines are increasing fastest in the real estate, energy and power and technology, media/entertainment and telecommunications (TMT) sectors.
