Irish M&A activity proved robust during the first six months of 2025, with deal volume increasing despite an extremely volatile geopolitical and macroeconomic backdrop. Value, however, has slipped back due to a slowdown in transformational deals in the country.
The first half of the year saw 236 deals worth €8.8bn announced in Ireland – compared to 227 deals worth €18.0bn during the same period in 2024. These figures are up 4% and down 51% respectively. This reverses the trend seen in overall European M&A in H1 2025, where value is up 1% but volume has decreased by 19% year-on- year.
Despite challenging global headwinds, overall deal volume remained resilient. In particular, the Trump administration's trade tariffs s announced in April had a chilling effect t on M&A activity globally, prompting many dealmakers to pause or postpone transactions. The uncertainty and volatility caused by the US's "Liberation Day", and President Trump's subsequent announcements, weighed heavily on activity throughout much of the second quarter.
International appetite for dealmaking has also been negatively affected due to concern about the slowing global economy. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) now expects the world economy to expand by 2.8% and 3.0% in 2025 and 2026 respectively, down from 3.3% in 2024.
However, the IMF now predicts GDP growth in Ireland will stand at 2.3% in 2025 and 2.1% in 2026 — a significant improvement on its earlier forecast of 1.2% for 2024.
In the context of these improving Irish GDP figures, which outstrip most other Eurozone jurisdictions, the relatively strong first-half M&A data for Ireland underlines the attractiveness of its companies to buyers and investors, including international bidders.
Indeed, the first quarter of the year was particularly busy, with 138 deals worth €6.3bn, up 30% and 48% in volume and value terms on the first quarter of 2024.
Some of that first-quarter strength may reflect a hangover of deals from the final months of 2024 when the uncertainties of the US election – as well as Ireland's own general election – caused delays. Nevertheless, Irish M&A was on a strong upward trajectory prior to "Liberation Day".
As in previous years, the vast majority of Irish M&A took place in the mid-market, but there were several larger transactions, with five deals valued at €500m or more. They included the largest deal of the first half, completed in May, with the €1.9bn acquisition of Nordic Aviation Capital A/S by Investment Corp of Dubai (ICD), the United Arab Emirates-based sovereign wealth fund (SWF), through its subsidiary Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE) Ltd.
The largest transactions of the first half came in a variety of sectors, spanning financial services, pharmaceuticals, and energy, as well as technology, media and telecoms (TMT). Looking across the whole market, business services and TMT were the busiest sectors in H1, though financial services accounted for most activity in value terms.
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