Australasia Investment Banking Snapshot – August 19, 2011

Australasia Investment Banking Snapshot – August 19, 2011

Australian M&A Reaches Record High

Australian-involvement M&A reached a record high of US$130.3 billion so far this year, up 78.1% from the same period last year and the busiest year-to-date volume.

Metals & Mining remains the busiest sector with US$27.8 billion, up 31.5% from the same period last year. However, bolstered by recent acquisitions of beverage companies, Food and Beverage sector saw one of the biggest upsurges with transactions reaching a total of US$18.1 billion from 33 deals compared to US$118.2 million from 25 deals in 2010 YTD.

Goldman Sachs, advising on 27 deals, is the top financial advisor for Australian-involvement announced M&A this year with 42.4% market share, up 8.5 market share points from the same period last year.

Japan Acquisitions into New Zealand Accounts for 67%

Japan's Asahi Group Holdings announced that it would buy New Zealand’s Independent Liquor in a deal worth US$1.3 billion to expand its overseas presence. A wholly-owned subsidiary of Asahi agreed to acquire all outstanding shares of Flavoured Beverages Group Holdings, which entirely holds Independent Liquor, from private equity firms Pacific Equity Partners, Unitas Capital and other undisclosed sellers for NZD 1.525 billion.

New Zealand inbound M&A this year reached US$2.1 billion, a 62.6% increase from the comparable period in 2010. Japan accounted for US$1.4 billion or 66.7% of the inbound transactions in dollar value compared to none in 2010 YTD.

Debt Capital Market Remains Sluggish

Bond issuance in Australasia this week slightly recovered with US$1.3 billion from 4 issues, compared to a single issue of US$41.5 million last week, driven by Australian debt offerings from Agency, Supranational and Sovereign issues. This week’s top deals from New South Wales Treasury and Queensland Treasury Corp brought the region’s total proceeds to US$86.4 billion, down 0.2%.

Agency, Supranational, Sovereign accounted for US$14.8 billion or 17.2% of the region’s debt proceeds, while Investment Grade registered 60.8% of the market share. Westpac Banking tops year-to-date underwriting for Australasia's debt issuance with 12.2% market share.

ENDS

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