The total number of M&A deals in Australasia grew last quarter for the first time in over a year according to mid-year Bloomberg M&A League Tables 2009, released today.
Freehills’ Corporate M&A partner, Rebecca Maslen-Stannage said the M&A landscape was changing and indicating some early positive signs, despite the overall number of deals being lower in comparison to this time in 2008.
‘It has been encouraging to see the first ‘up-tick’ in the number of M&A deals this quarter since the middle of last year,’ Ms Maslen-Stannage said. ‘There are a few positive signs. ‘Green shoots’ in M&A include the emergence of cornerstone investors and capital raisings to buy assets, not just to boost balance sheets.
‘There have been recent significant domestic capital raisings to accumulate future acquisition war-chests, including Viterra (for its acquisition of ABB) and Santos. There are also offshore buyers taking strategic cornerstone positions.’
Freehills has advised on most of the recent major cornerstone investments including Warburg Pincus on its investment in Transpacific, China Investment Corporation on its investment in the Goodman Group and GIC on its investment in GPT.
‘We are also starting to see the expectation gap between sellers and buyers narrowing. This trend commenced with the acquisition by National Australia Bank of Aviva. We expect steady flow of deals to continue throughout the year, as value buying opportunities continue to present themselves,’ Ms Maslen-Stannage said.
‘We also expect more buyers from offshore. We are seeing particularly strong interest from North America, China and Japan. In this challenging market, clients are demanding strong cross-border execution experience and the depth to get complex deals done quickly.’
Freehills achieved a clean sweep of the mid-year 2009 Thomson Reuters M&A league tables, taking out top spot in both volume and number of announced and completed deals in the Australia & New Zealand region. In the mid-year 2009 Bloomberg M&A league tables for Australia & New Zealand, Freehills advised on more announced deals than any other law firm in the region. Mergermarket has also recognised Freehills as 2009’s most active M&A firm in the Asia-Pacific region.
Freehills’ M&A team has acted on some of the market’s most innovative, complex and strategic deals during the first half of 2009 including advising:
- Cadbury on the divestment of its Australian beverage business to Asahi
- OZ Minerals on its sale of key assets
- Viterra Inc on its acquisition of ABB Grain Ltd
- Pure Energy Resources on its acquisition by BG Group
- Centro on its stabilisation arrangements
- Gloucester Coal on its recent M&A activity, and
- Morgan Stanley on its joint venture with Citi.
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