This Is What The Unprecedented Chinese M&A Scramble In America Looks Like

The raging need for Chinese oligarchs and corporations to park their cash offshore, and as far away as possible from the the mainland and the risk of sudden, sharp (10%-15%) devaluation, has resulted in not only an epic Vancouver housing bubble, or the predicted parabolic surge in bitcoin price (which has soared by 50% in just a few weeks), but an unprecedented M&A spree for US-based assets. We profiled as much in late March in a post titled "Eight Things The Chinese Are Scrambling To Buy In America."

And while overall M&A in the US is down substantially YTD, sliding 28% by volume (but only 4% in number of deals) mostly as a result of the volatile market in the early part of the year as well as the chilling effect of Congressional crackdown on tax-inversion deals (such as the pulled Pfizer-Allergan mega-merger), and the lack of any blockbuster mega-cap (>$25 billion) deals, China not only refuses to go away, but the level of Chinese cross-border M&A chasing after US targets is literally off the charts.

Here are the details from Goldman:

Cross-border, while down in aggregate, continues to gain share at 34% of total YTD volumes (a 6-year high). While the distribution of acquirers and targets remains relatively well diversified, one trend has been increased Chinese volumes. Notably, China has accounted for 26% of global cross-border activity YTD, which is nearly 3x higher than the next highest year (2013).

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