India’s Merger And Acquisition, Private Equity Activity Jumped 40 Per Cent In 2016

Merger and acquisition (M&A) and private equity (PE) activity in India rose by over 40 per cent in 2016. Compared to $43.5 billion in 2015, the country registered transactions worth $62.5 billion last year, IANS reported today.

As per the deal-tracker report prepared by Grant Thornton, the country recorded as 1,487 deals. M&A and PE activity recorded 1,615 in 2015, but most of these deals were smaller compared tho those seen in 2016.

Domestic deals drove M&A momentum, the report revealed, adding that the country registered a 59 per cent year-on-year (YoY) growth aggregating to $ 13.4 billion across 310 deals.

"2016 was a good year for deal makers with $62.5 bn worth of transactions spread across nearly 1,500 deals - a strong 40 per cent y-o-y increase in values was witnessed during the period," Prashant Mehra, Partner at Grant Thornton, was quoted by IANS as saying. Recovery of ‘big-ticket’ M&A deals, Mehra added, led to transaction values clocking at their highest levels in the last five years.