The outbreak of COVID-19 has brought unprecedented challenges to the global economy, pausing much of the activity across the world. After a long spell of record-high M&A activity over the past decade, deal-making was brought to a screeching halt as the pandemic shock diffused throughout the world economy. What was once expected to be a mostly uneventful environment, soon transformed into an unprecedented disruption that exploded after a good start to the year. As we weather this historic global health and economic crisis, it’s becoming evident that we are operating in a new – and to a large extent uncharted- M&A environment that continues to evolve. As dealmakers are trying to gain some clarity, the reality is that the economy will need to learn to operate under heightened uncertainty for a prolonged time. As the short and mid-term response continues to develop, and the economy is starting to accept that the resolve of the pandemic will take some time to emerge, the deal-making activity is showing signs of revival. After the Transactions Outlook 2020: An Overview of M&A Trends across Regions published right at the onset of the COVID-19 outbreak in which we outlined our M&A market expectations for 2020, we are revisiting the deal activity analysis to account for the unprecedented impact of the pandemic and help our clients reach a higher degree of clarity about what is expected in M&A space in the increasingly uncertain times ahead of us.
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