Australia, China, Corporate Finance and M&A, Regional Asia - Wednesday, September 30, 2009 13:26 - 0 Comments

IFR Asia: Asian M&A returns to the good old days

IFR Asia, September 2009

M&A in Asia has emerged from the credit crunch in a different shape than it entered it, but no less active. True, the jumbo private equity leveraged financings of 2006 have gone – for the moment, at least – but in its place have come new trends: China seeing cheap assets to be acquired, Australian resources attracting interest from around the world, and distressed or non-core holdings changing hands.

Activity has focused on China, India and Australia, and for banks with a presence in those markets business has been good. “We are very busy right now,” says Gordon Paterson, managing director and head of M&A for Asia Pacific at Deutsche Bank. “In fact quite frankly we’re as active as we’ve ever been in M&A.” Deal volume numbers might be down, but Paterson argues that is largely a function of lower share prices. Measured by number of deals, there have been a broadly similar number of announced transactions in the first nine months of 2009 as in the same period in 2007 or 2008. Continue…

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