White & Case has emerged as the top mergers and acquisition (M&A) legal adviser in the Middle East & Africa region for Q1-Q3 2021 by value and volume having advised on 21 deals worth US$20.2bn, which was the highest value among all the advisers. A total of 787 M&A deals were announced in the region during H1 2021, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

According to GlobalData’s report, ‘Global & Middle East Africa M&A Review & Legal Adviser League tables’, deal value for the region increased by 17.9% from US$67bn during Q1-Q3 2020 to US$79bn during Q1-Q3 2021.

Aurojyoti Bose, Lead Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “White & Case emerged as the clear winner as it was the only firm to advise on more than 20 deals and surpass the US$20bn mark. The firm advised on four billion-dollar deals (deals more than or equal to US$1bn), out of which one was a mega deal valued at more than US$10bn.”

Latham & Watkins occupied the second position in terms of value with ten deals worth US$10.4bn, followed by Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer with 13 deals worth US$6.4bn and Clifford Chance with ten deals worth US$5.1bn. Meysan Partners and Gorrissen Federspiel jointly occupied the fifth position with one deal worth US$4.8bn.

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer occupied the second position in terms of volume, followed by Latham & Watkins and Clifford Chance. Allen & Overy occupied the fifth position by volume with nine deals worth US$2.7bn.