Strong Irish merger activity continues with volume growth of 79%

IRISH-RELATED merger and acquisition & activity continued to grow during the third quarter, with year-on-year volume growth of 79% measured.

The combined value of deals done – 50 deals were recorded in the quarter, compared to 28 for the same three-month period last year – was up by 227% to €5.52 billion; the third highest quarterly deal value on record.

However, two deals – Ardagh Glass’s €1.7bn purchase of international packaging group Impress Co-operative; and AIB’s €3.1bn disposal of its Polish operations – heavily skewed the latest values; between them comprising 87% of the total deal value.

That said, deals done by Irish/Swiss bakery group, Aryzta and its off-shoot agri-food business, Origin – which recently formed a consumer foods joint venture with investment group, Capvest – also boosted overall business.

The figures come from the latest edition of NCB Corporate Finance’s quarterly merger and acquisition& tracker survey, which was published yesterday. The company’s director, Jonathan Simmons, said that, despite the high-profile cases seen in the last quarter, merger and acquisition &growth is likely to continue up to year’s end.

“The third quarter of the year continued to see deal volumes well above the low levels recorded in quarters two and three of 2009, and there continues to be activity related to the acquisitions of distressed businesses and assets. In addition, the quarter saw a number of large transactions, comparable with those of any previous quarter,” he said. “The continued level of around 40 deals per quarter is to be welcomed and can, hopefully, be maintained and supported by a number of factors including non-core asset disposals, further sales of distressed assets and further transactions in the more active sectors of financial services, food and IT/telecoms.”

NCB’s survey also revealed that Irish companies have continued to acquire overseas – 20 such purchases being measured during the period in question.