Romania's M&A market value falls to 343 mln euro in Q3 - Deloitte

Taking into account transactions with a still undisclosed value, the M&A market could reach an estimated 650-850 million euro in the third quarter of 2019, down from 1.4-1.6 billion euro in the second quarter of the same year, Deloitte said in a press release.

In the third quarter of 2018, the disclosed value of Romania's merger and acquisition market was 814 million euro.

In the second quarter of 2019, the M&A market's value was bigger compared with the third quarter due to the $568 million financing round obtained by UiPath, a robotic process automation (RPA) startup founded in Romania. Without this mega-deal, the value of the M&A market in the second quarter would have been 305 million euro, Deloitte said.

"In the third quarter of this year, M&A activity was significant, after an atypical quarter, in which it had accelerated strongly. For the rest of the year, we anticipate that the market will remain active, a significant number of M&A projects being carried out in various industries," Deloitte Romania corporate finance partner Ioana Filipescu Stamboli said.

In total, 29 transactions were announced in the third quarter of this year, including those whose value was not officially disclosed. In the similar period of 2018, 30 transactions had been announced. Deloitte's analysis did not take into account transactions worth less than 5 million euro each.

Deloitte estimates that one of the largest transactions in the third quarter of 2019 was the takeover of an 80% stake in seven Romanian wind farms from Danish wind turbine maker Vestas for 136 million euro by Ingka Group, the parent company of Swedish furniture retailer IKEA.

Next is the acquisition of the America House office building in Victoriei Square in Bucharest by Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing in partnership with David Hay. Within the same transaction, the Indotek group purchased the Promenada Mall in Targu-Mures.

Deloitte also mentioned the acquisition by Holcim Romania of the entire package of shares of Somaco Grup Prefabricate owned by Oresa and the acquisition by Gardenica Limited of the companies Pasteur Filiala Filipesti, Farmavet and of some assets of Agrozootehnica Pietroiu.

In 2018, Deloitte estimated the value of Romania's M&A market at 3.8 - 4.3 billion euro, including the deals whose values were not disclosed, which were significantly more compared to previous years.

($=0.8953 euro)