<\/p>\n
A potent rebound in global M&A is on track to deliver the second-highest total deal value on record in 2025, at a projected $4.8 trillion for the year, up 36% versus 2024, according to a report by Bain & Company.<\/p>\n
A wave of megadeals worth $5 billion or more propelled the year\u2019s resurgence in deal-making, as companies classed as \u2018infrequent acquirers\u2019, taking part in M&A relatively rarely, came off the sidelines to make big bets, with 2025\u2019s expected M&A deal count up by only 5%, despite the overall surge in total deal value.<\/p>\n
Deals worth $5 billion-plus contributed 75% of strategic deal value growth, with most of these \u2013 around 60% \u2013 by infrequent acquirers, and around two-fifths being transformative in scale, with a value of more than 50% of the acquirer\u2019s market capitalization.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n These big bets on large-scale, transformational mergers are potentially both high-risk and high reward for acquiring companies, requiring their leaders to put outsized focus on strategic and organizational integration and alignment to create and secure value, Bain\u2019s analysis cautions.<\/p>\n Technology M&A, powered by AI-related deals, was in the vanguard of the year\u2019s surge in merger activity. But the powerful revival in M&A is broad-based across industries and geographies, as well as classes of dealmakers, Bain\u2019s report finds, with deal value across all regions and industries rising by double-digit percentages.<\/p>\n “Companies across industries are seeing an urgent need to reboot strategy. Amid improved deal market conditions, with both buyers and sellers more confident about valuations, strategic buyers are again putting M&A front and center to drive business growth. The number one reason for increased dealmaking was M&A\u2019s central role in strategy, according to our survey of more than 300 M&A executives,” said Suzanne Kumar, the Executive Vice President of Bain & Company\u2019s M&A and Divestitures practice.<\/p>\n “We see important implications from the dealmaking rebound. This was a year of big bets by companies that traditionally make few deals, and often large-ticket deals become make-or-break moves. Big deals grounded in sound strategy can transform a business and set a new growth trajectory. But deals for less-strategic reasons can be a recipe for value destruction. It\u2019s impossible to overstate the importance to value-creation of clear and early answers to fundamental questions on factors such as shared vision, operating models, decision-making and execution and culture,” she stated.<\/p>\n Tech M&A is back in force in 2025, with deal value up more than 76% to $478 billion in the year-to-date. Notably, almost half of strategic technology deal value for deals larger than $500 million for the year so far involved AI-native companies or deals that cited AI benefits.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Advanced manufacturing was also a major driver of dealmaking, with value up 38% to $717 billion in the year-to-date.<\/p>\n Against the backdrop of the overall 36% rise in deal value expected for 2025, activity among all classes of dealmakers was sharply higher, with deal value up by 38% for strategic transactions, by 31% among financial investors, and by 28% among venture capital players.<\/p>\n A host of factors are identified by Bain\u2019s analysis as driving this year\u2019s new wave of M&A as companies took the decision to buy to grow and respond to changing profit pools. Many of the headwinds for M&A during the post-pandemic years have calmed, while regulations as well as the cost of capital have eased, Bain notes.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The buyer-seller gap for valuations has also eased, with valuations up a turn to 11.6x EV\/EBITDA, but remaining below 2021 peak levels in most industries, today\u2019s report says.<\/p>\n Uncertainties over tariffs and trade turbulence had a muted impact meanwhile, with an early pullback in dealmaking in April proving to be short-lived. The rate of cross-border deals has not changed substantially in 2025 and fewer than half of M&A executives surveyed by Bain said trade restrictions would impact their overall deal plans, while 70% said trade policy would not affect divestiture plans.<\/p>\n But while post-globalization trends did not have a large impact on M&A in 2025, Bain suggests it will have bigger effects over time, with early hints seen as non-US companies show a weaker appetite for US-based assets and US buyers become more likely to pursue domestic deals due to tariffs, according to Bain research.<\/p>\n Post-globalisation and increased protectionist policies are also likely to impact capital allocation to M&A, the report adds.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n With companies confronting costs for building resiliency into supply chains and investing in AI capabilities, automation and their technology infrastructure, M&A executives will likely face greater scrutiny on capital allocations to dealmaking and potentially a higher bar for deal ROI.<\/p>\n Despite the strengthened dealmaking in 2025, capital allocations to M&A were at a 10-year low this year, accounting for just 7% of cash expenditures by almost 700 S&P World Index companies, versus a 9% to 17% range of the prior nine years.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The decline in companies\u2019 capital spending on deals comes as other investment priorities, on everything from tech stacks, robots and AI to factories and energy farms crowd out M&A, Bain notes.<\/p>\n In a year marked by AI\u2019s rampant advancement, artificial intelligence was seen everywhere in the deal-making landscape. 75% of strategic acquirers have assessed the impact of AI on their target\u2019s business, while at least 20% had walked away as a consequence, Bain finds.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Alongside, use of AI by M&A executives more than doubled to 45% of practitioners. While deal sourcing and screening are still AI\u2019s main uses for M&A, more dealmakers have also begun relying on the technology for other functions such as planning and executing integrations.<\/p>\n <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A potent rebound in global M&A is on track to deliver the second-highest total deal value on record in 2025, at a projected $4.8 trillion for the year, up 36% versus 2024, according to a report by Bain & Company. A wave of megadeals worth $5 billion or more propelled the year\u2019s resurgence in deal-making, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5329,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bez-rubriki"],"featured_image_src":{"landsacpe":["https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Private-equity-1-1140x445.jpg",1140,445,true],"list":["https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Private-equity-1-463x348.jpg",463,348,true],"medium":["https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Private-equity-1-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"full":["https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Private-equity-1.jpg",1200,800,false]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5328"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5328\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5330,"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5328\/revisions\/5330"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relinvestmentsgroup.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}