Retail Apparel, Luxury Segments See M&A Activity Decline

While mergers and acquisitions activity in the global consumer sector is on fire, the fashion apparel, luxury and personal care segments have cooled significantly. The Mergermarket Group released its quarterly report on global consumer M&A deals that revealed a 67.5 percent year-over-year increase in deal values, which totaled $142.8 billion. There were 386 transactions in the sector during the quarter, and Mergermarket analysts said the gains were mostly due to two mega deals: the Kraft Foods/H.J. Heinz $54.5 billion merger; and the CKH/Hutchison deal in Hong Kong that had a $40.8 billion valuation. “These two mega-deals accounted for 66.7 percent of the global consumer M&A value,” the analysts said. “As a result of these two deals, the food and retail subsectors both jumped to more than $50 billion for the first quarter since 2007.” Regarding retail apparel, personal care and luxury sub-sectors, activity showed a steep decline. These segments along with consumer electronics “dropped significantly for the second consecutive quarter,” the reported stated, declining to $9.4 billion from $16.8 billion in the fourth quarter of 2014 and decreasing 77.8 percent in the year-over-year comparison. The analysts noted that activity in the consumer sector will likely center on two brand giants: Sony and Proctor &

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