Thomson Takes a Snapshot

Thomson Financial has just released an M&A and Private Equity Snapshot, for year-to-date 2007. Here it is: M&A Snapshot.xls

Bullet points include:

* Private Equity M&A accounts for 20.5% of year-to-date M&A activity, up nearly 4 percentage points from last year at this time. Private Equity activity in the U.S. accounts for 35% of overall activity, up from 16.3% of activity during the year ago period. 

* Private Equity buyers account for 12.6% of this year’s activity in Europe, down from 22.5% at this time last year. 
* Worldwide M&A volumes totals $2.18 trillion, a 77% increase from last year at this time; US Volume totals $802 billion, a 54% increase; European Volume totals $983.6 billion, a 129% increase. 

* Worldwide Private Equity M&A totals $447 billion, a 114% increase from last year at this time. U.S Private Equity activity is up more than 200% over year-to-date 2006. 

* Worldwide Strategic M&A totals $1.7 trillion, a 69% increase from last year at this time. 

* Triple digit year-over-year growth in a diverse number of industries – Financials, Industrials, Real Estate, Consumer Staples and High Technology. 

* Worldwide targets in the Retail and Telecom sectors are the only groups to lag last year’s activity. 

* Private Equity buyers are creeping into traditionally non-private equity sectors including – Financials, Energy & Power, High Technology and Telecom.