The COVID-19 pandemic, US-China trade war and broader economic uncertainty, which had already slowed organic growth, continue to affect the deal landscape of the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region too. Against this backdrop, even though deal activities began to pick up speed in October 2020 they remained below the third quarter (Q3) monthly average levels, reveals GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

An analysis of GlobalData’s Financial Deals Database reveals that a total of 1,888 deals were announced in APAC during October 2020, a decline of 13.2% over the 2,176 deals announced during the previous month.

However, deal volume during the month remained above the first quarter (Q1) and second quarter (Q2) monthly average levels but lower than the third quarter (Q3) monthly average levels.

Aurojyoti Bose, Lead Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “October demonstrated a downward trend in deal activity in the APAC region, after showing consecutive growth for four months. The fluctuation in the deal activity could be attributed to the volatile market environment.”

While Thailand, New Zealand, Japan, and South Korea witnessed month-on-month increase in deal volume by 136.4%, 80.0%, 14.9% and 3.8%, respectively, during October, Australia, India, Malaysia, China, Singapore, and Hong Kong witnessed decline by 11.1%, 12.7%, 24.1%, 25.1%, 44.4%, and 65.2%, respectively.

Deal activity also remained inconsistent across different deal types. Licensing agreements more than doubled and debt offerings deal volume increased by 3.5% during October compared to the previous month, whereas the number of contract service agreements, M&As, equity offerings, venture financing, private equity, and partnerships decreased by 5.6%, 6.1%, 18.4%, 21.9%, 25.3%, and 33.8%, respectively.