A total of 28,151 deals (mergers & acquisitions (M&A), private equity and venture financing deals) were announced globally during the first half (H1) of 2023, which was a 23.7% decline compared to the announcement of 36,873 deals during the same period in 2022, reveals GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

An analysis of GlobalData’s Financial Deals Database reveals that all the deal types under the coverage witnessed an year-on-year (YoY) decline during H1 2023. The number of M&A deals declined by 17.4% while deal volume for private equity deals and venture financing deals registered a decline of 23.5% and 31.2%, respectively.

Aurojyoti Bose, Lead Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “2023 has not been a good year so far for deal activity. Plagued by challenging factors such as rising interest rates, high inflation, fear of recession and geopolitical tensions, the first half of the year has already seen a considerable decline in deal activity.”

North America continued to dominate the global deals landscape despite witnessing 26.4% YoY decline in deals volume H1 2023. Europe, Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Africa and South and Central America regions also witnessed YoY decline in deal activity by 19.9%, 20.9%, 29% and 32.2%, respectively, during H1 2023.

Several key global markets witnessed YoY decline in deal activity during H1 2023. For instance, deal volume for the US, China, the UK, Canada, India, Japan, Germany, France, Australia, and South Korea declined by 27.9%, 11.6%, 15%, 12.3%, 31.4%, 14.3%, 23.8%, 18.2%, 22.4% and 37.5%, respectively, in H1 2023 compared to H1 2022.