Merger Market Report MampA activity sees a drop AZB tops the MampA chart with 1116 billion Desai Diwanji with highest number of MampA deals

Merger Market, an independent Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) intelligence service has released its latest report for M&A Roundup Q1-Q3 2011. Indian M&A saw a significant decrease in the first nine months of 2011 of 41.5 percent by value compared to the same period in 2010. However, on a quarter to quarter basis, M&A activity in Q3 2011 registered strong growth and increased from $ 3.7 billion in Q2 to $ 8.3 billion.

Interestingly, the global M&A activity for the first three quarters of 2011 totaled $ 1,723 billion, up 21.8 percent compared to the same period in 2010 ($ 1,414.4 billion). In the third quarter of 2011, $ 513.9 billion-worth of deals were announced globally, down 9.3 percent from Q2 2011 ($ 566.3 billion).

In the Asia-pacific region, India accounted for 8.7 percent of the total deals in terms of value with the Reliance – BP’s $7.2 billion deal and Vodafone buy-out Essar stake for $5.5 billion topping the M&A activity table. 

Merger Market tracks M&A activity in terms of value of transactions and the number of transactions. In terms of value of the transactions, AZB & Partners topped the league table with 24 deals amounting to $11.16 billion followed by Linklaters with 7 deals and value of $ 9 billion. Allen & Overy took the third spot with just 3 deals amounting to $ 8.6 billion.

In terms of the big ticket M&A deals, AZB advised on the Reliance – BP deal. S&R Associates advised Vodafone on its India Joint Venture partner, Essar Group’s 33 percent stake buy out.

The best friends, TTA and Linklaters also joined on the mega Reliance – BP deal. TTA and S&R took the fourth and sixth spot, respectively by value as both the firms were involved in the big ticket deals, although both these firms were not amongst the leaders when it came to volume of deals.

Desai Diwanji took the first spot in the league table by volume with 33 deals while by value it is ranked way below at the thirteenth position. AZB takes the second position with 24 deals. Khaitan’s share of the M&A deal flow increased (in terms of volume) and has jumped up to the third position from sixth position in 2010 with 23 deals though it appears that majority of these deals were not big ticket deals as Khaitan is ranked eleventh in term of value of deals.

Amarchand & Mangaldas acted as legal advisor on 15 deals and is ranked fourth by volume. However, in terms of value of the deals Amarchand is at the tenth position with deals worth $4 billion.

The other Indian legal players like JSA ranked fifth by volume with 10 deals while in terms of value of the deals JSA ranked at twelfth position with deals valued at $3.3 billion. Trilegal advised on 10 transactions and made its entry to the league table by volume though Trilegal did not appear in the league table by value.

Below are the rankings by value and volume compiled by Merger Market for Q1-Q3 of 2011. 

Bar & Bench had earlier reported Merger Market’s report for the first half of 2011. 

Complete Merger Market is available here.

Merger Market: Legal Advisers to M&A for Q1-Q3 2011