Cayman top target destination for deals: Appleby

25-09-2014

The Cayman Islands were the top target destination for deals the second quarter of 2014, with 205 deals worth a total of $40.6 billion and accounting for 32 percent of all offshore deals.

This is the finding of Appleby’s second edition of Offshore-I for 2014 which analyses mergers and acquisitions for the offshore region, which added that the deals in Cayman accounted for half of all dollars spent on offshore targets.

In Cayman, the number of local deals was up 45 percent when compared with the same quarter last year, and the jurisdiction’s deal value was up 267 percent as a result of the planned Alibaba Group IPO. 

In the second quarter of 2014, 632 deals were announced involving offshore targets, which in combination were worth $80.9 billion. The number of deals is almost identical to the 642 deals recorded in the first quarter of the year.

The combined value of offshore deals in the second quarter of 2014 jumped 23 percent over the previous quarter, making it one of the highest value quarters of the past decade. Given that the first half of the year is frequently quieter than the second half, Appleby said this is encouraging news for the remainder of 2014.

“For six consecutive quarters total deal values have either increased or remained level, and the last three quarters have seen values jump more than 20 percent on the quarter previously,” said Cameron Adderley, partner and global head of corporate & commercial. “Companies appear to be putting more money to work on offshore deals, and an upward trajectory is gathering momentum.”

As a region, offshore, now sits in fourth place by deal values behind only the three regional giants - North America, Western Europe and Asia. However, the average transaction that took place offshore in the second quarter of 2014 was 8 percent larger than in North America; 73 percent bigger than in Western Europe; and three and a half times the size of the average deal done in the Middle East.

Appleby, Offshore-I, Cayman, Cameron Adderley,

Cayman Funds