Asia Pacific M&A Review 2014

Herbert Smith Freehills is pleased to announce the publication of its inaugural Asia Pacific M&A Review: offering insights into emerging trends in Asia Pacific from our M&A experts across the region.

This year’s review considers performance in 2013 and looks forward to prospects for 2014 across Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Myanmar, Singapore, South Korea and Thailand. We also provide an industry focus, looking at developments in private equity, energy, and telecommunications media and technology. 

Some of the key themes we saw emerge in 2013 include:

• A strong rebound in M&A activity in the second half of the year in a number of Asia Pacific countries. Deal value in the second half of 2013 was up by 45% compared to the first half of the year, with deal volume up by 23% in the same period. 
• Energy and Resources was again a key sector driving M&A activity in terms of both deal value and volume. 
• Private equity returned as a buy-side force in many countries, although higher deal volumes were primarily driven by higher mid-market activity.  

Factors such as such as increased business confidence, a liberalisation of foreign investment regulation, and opportunities created by regional free trade agreements such as the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership, are all likely to impact on deals in the region. We anticipate: 

• Increased divestitures of non-core business and assets across a number of jurisdictions will provide sell-side momentum.
• M&A activity will continue to improve in 2014 and the volume of cross-border deals will increase compared to 2013.
• There will be a continue focus on the balance between countries in the region remaining attractive investment destinations, and domestic developments in foreign investment, anti-trust and broader M&A law.