Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) witnessed a sharp jump in value terms in the second quarter of calendar 2018, growing 6.8 times to $34.8 bn from a year earlier on the back of Walmart’s acquisition of Flipkart. The second quarter of last calendar year had witnessed M&A deals worth $5.1 bn. The June quarter also witnessed a 19% growth in the number of deals, with 273 M&A transactions being reported. Financial services recorded the highest number of deals with a total of 39 transactions worth $1.1 bn, followed by consumer and retail sector with 30 deals worth $16.5 bn. Other sectors such as telecom (two deals worth $5.4 bn), diversified industrial products (23 deals worth $2.9 bn) and metals and mining (six deals worth $960 mn) also clocked substantially high deal value as well. Restructuring deals will remain active in the coming months as cleaning up bad loans is a major priority for banks. Cross-border M&A activity in the second quarter touched a record high as inbound deal value touched a total of $23.2 bn across 69 deals on the back of the Walmart-Flipkart deal.

(Live Mint)