Acquisitions and mergers are taking place worldwide

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Siemens Healthineers is involved in the global M&A business

Daniel Karmann / dpa

After the stock exchange has long ticked off the corona crisis, the market for company acquisitions and mergers is now apparently back on track. A whole series of large deals around the globe suggest that the M&A business is currently making a comeback worldwide.

Eight transactions over the ten billion dollar mark alone came in the past six weeks in a dry cloth, reports the "Financial Times" with reference to data from Refinitiv. According to the newspaper, no second half of the year began so strongly since 2007, when the market was booming shortly before the financial crisis.

The list of deals includes the $ 21 billion sale of Marathon Petroleum's gas station business to Seven & i Holding. In addition, the takeover of the chip manufacturer Maxim Integrated by Analog Devices for 20 billion dollars is on it. The largest deal in Europe in recent weeks was the agreement by Siemens Healthineers to take over the US company Varian Medical Systems for 16.4 billion dollars.

"It seems quite extraordinary how this comeback is taking place," quoted the "FT" Michael Carr , the co-head of the M&A business at the US bank Goldman Sachs.

more on the subject

• "Low-cost opportunity": Oil giant Chevron buys competitor Noble Energy for five billion dollars

• Analog Devices swallows Maxim Integrated: billion dollar deal in the US semiconductor industry

• Acquisition of Varian Medical Systems: Siemens Healthineers wants to go into the Dax with a billion-dollar deal

Before that, the corona crisis brought a six-year upswing in global M&A business to a temporary end. Companies as well as investors held back with transactions in the uncertain time and waited to see how things would develop.

This waiting apparently has come to an end. Experts expect that the upswing in global M&A business can certainly continue. Alison Harding-Jones , head of European and African M&A business at Citigroup, says "FT" is busy working on further transactions behind the scenes . "We expect further strategic acquisitions, mergers of companies in industries that have been particularly hard hit by the crisis, and an increasing number of private equity offers."

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