Goldman Sachs has dominated the latest mergers and acquisitions (M&A) league table of the top 10 financial advisers in Europe based on deal value in 2019, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

The American investment bank advised on 100 deals worth US$312.5bn.

According to GlobalData, which tracks all M&A, private equity/venture capital and asset transaction activity around the world to compile the league tables, JP Morgan ranked second with 95 deals worth US$296.4bn.

Ravi Tokala, Financial Deals Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “Despite recording a slight uptick in Q4 2019, the total deals value for European targets decreased by 21.33% in 2019 from the same period last year to US$810.2bn. This is mostly attributed to a fall in the number of European targeted megadeals (>US$10b) announced in 2019.”

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Europe deals market in 2019

The deal volume in Europe saw an increase by 25% from 11,675 in 2018 to 14,594 in 2019. Deal value declined by 21.33% from US$1,029.9bn in 2018 to US$810.2bn in 2019.

Goldman Sachs, which topped the league table of M&A financial advisers in North America, also claimed top position in GlobalData’s recently released global league table of top 20 M&A financial advisers.

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer leads top 10 M&A legal advisers list

Law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer emerged as the lead player in the list of top 10 legal advisers, in terms of deal value. It advised on 97 deals worth a combined US$181.3bn. Slaughter and May occupied second position in terms of value, advising on 40 deals worth US$134.6bn. In the global league table of top 20 M&A legal advisers, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer secured fifteenth position.