Passengers walk past greeters in the arrival hall for international flights at Pudong International Airport in Shanghai, China. Picture: Qilai Shen/BloombergChina’s reopened borders and renewed focus on boosting the sagging economy have brightened the deals outlook, with bankers starting to field interest for mergers and acquisitions and fundraising involving the world’s second-largest economy.
“We see strategic sectors, hard-core industrial technology, automation, semiconductor-related [businesses] to be a focus for outbound activity,” said Mark Webster, partner and head of Singapore at BDA Partners, an Asia-focused investment banking adviser. Outbound M&A involving companies in China halved last year to the lowest point since 2006, Refinitiv data showed, which pulled total Chinese company-led deal making to its lowest point in nine years.
The reopening coincided with a thaw in regulatory scrutiny that had seen overseas Chinese IPOs grind to a halt in the past 18 months amid proposed rule changes, and the tech sector struggle with a range of new regulations.