BDO Horizons is a publication focusing on global M&A trends in the SME sector, with the aim of providing expert insights and forecasts on the M&A market and its evolution. The quarterly publication provides an overview of the M&A landscape in different geographical regions.

Welcome to the summer edition of Horizons in 2025, our regional analysis written by BDO M&A professionals from around the world.

The overall global data shows a decline on deal activity in the first half of 2025, a drop of around 14%, compared with the second half of 2024. This year has been dominated so far by the speculation and realities of the impact of US trade tariffs. Private equity has held dealmaking activity much better than trade and, with all data taken into account, this period would have looked significantly worse without 
the private equity contribution.

The heat chart still shows that the expected level of transactions is considerably down if compared to 
the last few years of data. However, pipelines in the mid-market where we operate, are still healthy. 
The reality is that both private equity and trade buyers have ample resources to invest and once the 
dust settles down on the tariffs front, we would expect deal activity to improve. 

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