Acquisition International Asian M&A Buoyant Despite Slowdown

Tokyo, Japan, November 26, 2015 --(PR.com)-- Acute volatility on the two mainland Chinese equity markets, the Shanghai Composite and the Shenzhen Composite, wiped trillions of dollars off the value of the biggest Chinese companies in a protracted selloff than began in mid-June following measures by financial regulators aimed at reducing the use of margin trading by inexperienced investors.

Adding to the headwinds, China, the region’s largest and the world’s second biggest economy has experienced a marked slowdown in the rate of its economic expansion but M&A deals have still managed to top US$614 billion this year.

“That number is pretty impressive,” said Noburo Matsushita co-head of Technology & Internet Synergies at Acquisition International, “especially given the broader market overhang of the promise of tighter monetary policy in the United States which, much as some people like to pretend isn’t important, still has a large influence on what goes on in Asian markets.”

Acquisition International’s Asian M&A Activity Report, which is available for download on its website, says that the lion’s share of the deal making is concentrated on the so-called “megatrends” of health, FMCG and real estate.

Despite this, Acquisition International cautions that the opacity of deals done by private equity firms makes it difficult to prove its own suspicions that Internet and technology-related deals eclipsed the mega trends by a comfortable margin in 2015.

“Technology and Internet deals are often put together by PE because they usually provide much of the startup costs and seed/angel investment capital here in Asia,” explained Matsushita.