Megadeals push global M&A to record USD 2.8 tn as Adnoc, Salic, and BlueFive line up more transactions

Happy Monday, everyone. It’s a busy (and M&A-heavy) column despite it being the start of the week, so we’re going to jump right in:

Global M&A hit a record USD 2.8 tn in 1H 2026 thanks to a flurry of megadeals that sent transaction values up 49% y-o-y even as the number of deals fell 9% to c. 24k, a six-year low, the Financial Times reports, citing data from LSEG Just 47 transactions worth more than USD 10 bn accounted for over USD 1.3 tn — nearly half of global deal value. Bain’s midyear outlook tells a similar story, finding that strategic M&A value rose 36% y-o-y despite the total number of transactions ticking up just 2%.

Companies, not private equity outfits, are placing most of those bets: Financial sponsor value fell 9% even as strategic buyers pushed ahead, the Bain report shows. The group points out two things to watch for next: The usual “post-acquisition integration” challenges go way up with megadeals — and every transaction now needs an AI lens and an AI cost line. Bain has full-year dealmaking on pace for USD 5.3 tn, just short of 2021’s USD 5.6 tn record.

Goldman bankers are laughing all the way to the bank: The 1H bragging rights go to Goldman Sachs, which captured 44% of EMEA’s USD 676 bn M&A market — its largest share in nearly a decade.

MEANWHILE- We think plenty of the M&A activity Bain expects in the back half of the year is going to be driven by Adnoc, which Bloomberg reports is reviewing a list of 10 banks to whom to throw business — raising hopes at Goldman and elsewhere and causing a pucker moment for Moelis & Co. and PJT Partners, which advise Adnoc today.

AND- Could the next Saudi M&A wave come from insurance? Saudi Arabia’s new risk-based capital regime takes effect 1 January 2027, and seven listed Saudi insurers already carry accumulated losses above 20% of share capital. S&P analysts expect the rules to force consolidation among the weakest. The Saudi insurance market has already shrunk from 33-34 companies a decade ago to 25 listed today — against just 11 listed banks.

The Sisi administration thinks state-controlled EgyptAlum is worth a lot more than the market is paying and wants to see the EGX-listed aluminum producer’s valuation rise 3-4x before deciding between a stake sale or a transfer to the Sovereign Fund, a senior government official tells EnterpriseAM. Officials say serious acquisition interest is already on the table, with one offer from a Gulf buyer and two from Europe.

EgyptAlum has a market cap of around EGP 118 bn (USD 2.4 bn) today, and the case for a richer multiple is based on how much pipeline risk investors are willing to carry — an agreement with Trafigura could double capacity to c. 600k tons a year and the company argues there’s a USD 3 bn alumina refinery with Bahrain’s Alba in the works for which lenders have appetite.

The timing isn’t accidental: The UAE’s EGA has pushed its IPO to next year at the earliest as it works to bring a war-damaged smelter back online, and IHC and Adani are placing a big aluminum bet in India (see story, above).

A Saudi agri-and-food-security platform in the making? PIF-owned Salic is folding Continental Farmers Group into Olam Agri, moving its wholly-owned Ukrainian unit into the Singapore agrifood giant it took 80% of for USD 1.8 bn, according to a statement. There’s no new money changing hands — this is Saudi making an integrated agrifood play to help offset the risk it runs from importing 70-80% of its food.

SOUND SMART- Abu Dhabi pioneered the play a few years back when ADQ built out an agrifoods play centered on Louis Dreyfus and Al Dahra. We think the Saudi move could be a prelude to more M&A.

BlueFive Capital co-led an almost-USD 3 bn round for Chinese video-generation outfit Kling AI at a USD 18 bn valuation, alongside a range of big-name Chinese players, among them CPE, Tencent, Baidu, and Alibaba Cloud, according to a statement. It was the Abu Dhabi investment manager’s third transaction in a single week — after a controlling stake in Dubai dredger Gulf Cobla and a cross-border ownership swap with Saudi’s Al Murjan Group. The transaction is also its fourth move in China in under 12 months.

Egypt’s central bank is tightening the rules on bank investments in corporate and securitized bonds, with new measures on concentration caps, a BBB- rating floor, risk weights of up to 300%, and a bar on holding paper you’ve guaranteed, according to a circular (pdf). It could have a big impact on Egypt’s real estate industry: The requirement that developer securitizations be backed by delivered units cuts against how the market actually issues.

Why it matters in MENA+: Egypt runs the deepest securitization market in our region — it’s how consumer and small-business lenders as well as real estate companies turn to instead of bank debt. The deep, well-regulated market has Riyadh and Abu Dhabi studying it as they write their own rulebooks. Tadawul has drafted amendments that would give asset-backed issuances their own framework, while UAE lenders are closing private deals with the bulge bracket — think Deem Finance’s USD 400 mn securitization with JPMorgan — while they wait for rules that cover private placements.

GO DEEPER- We mapped all three markets, including Egypt’s regulatory correction, last month.

ALSO WORTH KNOWING THIS MORNING-

Egypt’s Badreldin family paid EGP 4.1 bn (c. USD 83 mn) for the remaining 40% of the holding company behind West Cairo’s Arkan Plaza, buying out two funds tied to Kuwait’s Public Institution for Social Security, according to a report.

Raya Holding closed its EGP 641 mn sale of 90% of Ostool Transport to Qalaa’s Ascom Geology & Mining, according to regulatory filings (here, pdf and here, pdf), netting a 30.5% premium to fair value and the end of a six-year exit saga for a company Raya and Qalaa founded together in 2010.

The IFC is weighing a USD 25 mn loan to EGX-listed snackfoods giant Edita to more than double capacity at its Baghdad plant by 2028, according to a project disclosure.

Khobar developer Rikaz is weighing an IPO to bankroll a 13 mn sqm warehousing and logistics buildout across the Kingdom, CEO Khalid Al Gahtani said, according to a report.

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