M&A market awaiting a boom in 2025: Experts

The mergers and acquisitions (M&A) market is eyeing a booming year in 2025 when delayed deals are likely to resume thanks to a better business environment, according to experts.

Nguyen Cong Ai, Deputy General Director of KPMG Vietnam, noted that Vietnam’s M&A market is following the global slowdown. However, he held that the country will continue to attract investment in key sectors such as real estate, consumer goods, and the industrial sector, with emerging opportunities in technology, renewable energy, and finance.

He quoted data from KPMG, which revealed that in the first three quarters of 2024, Vietnam’s mergers and acquisitions recorded 3.2 billion USD worth of transactions, a 45.9% increase over the previous year. The real estate, consumer goods, and industrial sectors accounted for 88% of the deals, with average deal sizes around 56.3 million USD.

According to Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Duc Tam, there was a decline in M&A deals in the first 10 months of 2024, with only 2,669 foreign-invested deals valued at over 3.68 billion USD in total. This represents a 10.4% decrease in the number of deals and a 29% drop in value compared to 2023.

Ai held that following a year of accumulation in 2024, a boom is expected for the M&A market of Vietnam in 2025 as investors’ interest is diversifying to many new and attractive sectors besides old ones like real estate, consumption and industry.

Experts predicted that activity will improve in 2025, with delayed deals likely to resume. The return of investors, particularly from Japan, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, and the US, is expected to drive this recovery. The Vietnamese Government’s active support for high-growth sectors, infrastructure development, and digitalisation is expected to play a key role in revitalising the market, they said.

Particularly, Ai perceived that among all economic sectors, renewable energy, health care, and education are bright spots.

Meanwhile, in the field of real estate, David Jackson, General Director of Avison Young Vietnam, predicted that industry, logistics, commercial housing, offices and complex projects will dominate the M&A market in the coming time.

He explained that new laws are set to help shorten legal procedures and better protect the rights and interests of stakeholders, thereby making the investment environment more stable and transparent.

Foreign investors remain optimistic about the outlook of the Vietnamese economy and its real estate sector, and will continue pursuing their strategy to expand and diversify investment portfolios in the country, said Jackson.