Cautious but optimistic M&A outlook
Despite market volatility and worries about European sovereign debt, which has led to a third consecutive quarterly decline in M&A activity, the MacIntyre Hudson corporate finance team has been extremely busy over the last twelve months, completing 16 deals across a number of sectors including disposals, acquisitions, MBOs, refinancing and growth capital fundraising deals. The team’s latest success story is the sale this month of Buckingham-based farm animal products supplier Cox & Robinson (Agricultural) Limited to Mole Valley Farmers, a farm supply cooperative headquartered in South Molton.
"Confidence is getting back on track"
Laurence Whitehead, principal and head of corporate finance lead advisory services, comments: “We are seeing signs that confidence is getting back on track but global events have lead to continuing negative sentiment. Examples being the ongoing unrest in certain Middle East countries and the downgrading of the US credit rating. Closer to home a stubbornly high level of inflation, the government’s austerity measures and the instability of various Eurozone economies have also heightened caution amongst business owners. Access to capital is one of the key issues affecting growth but not the only one. Organic growth per se is proving difficult for some strong businesses in the current economic climate, so acquisitions are the obvious solution. Although evidence suggests that business owners have a greater appetite to do deals, executing and closing them is another matter. One of the big problems continues to be the valuation gap between buyer and seller. Until there is some converging of views in this area, concluding transactions may still prove to be problematic.”
Peter Petyt joins as a principal
However, the corporate finance team is hoping to see increased levels of M&A activity in 2012. Consequently Peter Petyt has been recruited and appointed as a principal. Peter qualified with Deloitte and spent over ten years in industry before commencing his career in corporate finance with Pridie Brewster. He was subsequently head of corporate finance at both UHY Hacker Young in London and BTG McInnes in London, before running his own corporate finance boutique for just over two years, also in London. Latterly he was corporate finance partner at BDO in Bahrain.
“I’m pleased to be joining this very progressive firm at a time of growth for the corporate finance team” says Peter. “There is a compelling opportunity for us to leverage our excellent combined national and international contacts in this challenging market.”
Laurence adds: “We are delighted to secure the services of Peter on his return from the Middle East. He is well connected and has demonstrated an ability to get deals done despite the tough M&A market conditions. Having also recently added Leicester-based director Mukesh Bulsara to our national corporate finance team, Peter’s appointment shows our intention to develop the expertise we are able to offer to our clients across the UK and globally. We look forward to the challenges of 2012 and to continuing our deal successes.”
Contact us
For further information, please contact a member of our Corporate Finance team or email your enquiry to mhcfinfo@mhllp.co.uk
