Chinese firms spend record US$61 billion on outbound M&As in 2015 focusing on tech, entertainment, financial services and property

Companies in mainland China spent a record US$61 billion in global outbound mergers and acquisitions completed last year, which targeted major assets in the technology, entertainment, financial services and property sectors.

That total was around 16 per cent higher than in 2014, when global cross-border deals by Chinese companies reached US$53 billion, according to a report published Tuesday by research firm Rhodium Group.

China had a roughly 6 per cent share of the estimated US$1 trillion in global cross-border mergers and acquisitions transactions that were closed last year, it said. That was down from a high of nearly 10 per cent in 2013.

The United States, Australia and the 28 countries of the European Union accounted for almost two-thirds of all the Chinese outbound transactions completed in the past 12 months.

Analysts predicted that total Chinese direct investment in the US alone for 2015 would surpass US$10 billion for the third consecutive year, despite a stock market crash in China last summer.

“Greater appetite for mature assets and better awareness of political and commercial risks in emerging economies have further accelerated the shift of investment activity from developing to advanced economies,” Rhodium analysts Thilo Hanemann and Cassie Gao said in the report.