What’s Ahead for Mergers and Acquisitions in 2025?

What’s Ahead for Mergers and Acquisitions in 2025?

M&A is back on the front foot—but it isn’t 2021. The market is selective, policy-sensitive, and timing-driven. If you want to close, you need to be right on sequencing (regulatory lanes), structure (capital stacks that clear), and signals (who’s actually buying this quarter). That’s the operating premise for the next four quarters.

Altss’s view—built on live OSINT signals across filings, dockets, hiring, and capital flows—is below. Where a hard number or rule matters, we cite it. Everywhere else, assume this is our analysis of what’s actually moving deals.

The setup: value is up, breadth is not

Through early August 2025, announced global M&A value is up versus last year while deal counts remain well below prior-cycle norms. Translation: more dollars, fewer tickets, a higher bar.

Implications

• If you’re not bidding on megadeals, win by owning the mid-market: carve-outs, platform add-ons, and sponsor-to-sponsor trades with pre-papered remedies and certainty of funds.
• If you are bidding up-market, assume an industrial-logic test (credible synergies, disciplined perimeter) and a process test (filings sequenced, mitigation anticipated, day-one integration mapped).

Policy & process: permission still decides pace

U.S. antitrust. The posture is evolving rather than disappearing. A notable Supreme Court order in April 2025 allowed the White House to remove an FTC commissioner—political pressure on the agency’s stance—while DOJ continues to focus on AI-adjacent market power. In practice: overlaps in chips, AI infrastructure, and defense-adjacent assets still pull extended reviews; clean tuck-ins with obvious remedies clear faster.

CFIUS and the new outbound rules. Inbound national-security review remains table-stakes. The outbound investment regime took effect on January 2, 2025 for certain semiconductor, AI, and quantum exposures—add that diligence lane to outbound JVs, corporate venture, and minority stakes. CFIUS monitoring has also become more hands-on post-closing; build time for mitigation and compliance.

EU FSR. The Foreign Subsidies Regulation is now a real filing track on large cross-border deals, with state-link scrutiny shaping timelines. If your financing stack includes sovereign support or concessional terms, plan an FSR workstream alongside merger control.

Australia. A mandatory merger regime begins January 1, 2026, with voluntary notifications already live. Expect longer clocks and earlier regulator engagement on AU-nexus transactions.

Operating rule: treat regulatory sequencing as a workstream, not a footnote. Where the logic is obvious, offer the remedy before it’s demanded.

Funding conditions: easier, not easy

Rates have eased at the margin but remain well above the 2021–2022 trough. Financing is available, terms are discriminating.

Stacks that clear

• Private credit anchors (unitranche, stretch senior) for speed and certainty; use PIK toggles sparingly to bridge timing.
• Club equity for $1B+ deals where concentration limits bite.
• Room for integration capex; covenant headroom is a strategy, not a footnote.

If your base-case stack only works in one market print, it’s not bankable.

Where the flow is—and what to underwrite

Energy, renewables & hard infrastructure

Upstream consolidation from 2024 continues to ripple—non-core sales, inventory trades, and regional scale plays. Long-duration capital targets grid, storage, and carbon management. Diligence now includes permits and tariff pass-through math, not just geology and midstream.

Technology, data infrastructure & cyber

AI’s physical layer—data centers, fiber, edge, power/cooling—is consolidating. Data-center M&A recently hit record territory, and 2025 is printing large cyber and infra deals. Bind power like a core input and treat data rights as a gating diligence item.

Healthcare & life sciences

Big-pharma pipeline gaps persist; expect bespoke $1–5B platform buys and CDMO roll-ups. Policy risk (pricing and overlap theories) is the constraint; unit economics and clear clinical/operational evidence are the unlock.

Cross-border: add two lanes to every plan

National security: CFIUS for inbound; outbound rules for U.S. capital in AI/semis/quantum.

Subsidy scrutiny: EU FSR where state-linked financing is in the chain.

Assume longer clocks and more mitigation on sensitive assets. Sequence filings so one regime doesn’t strand the others.

Activism: catalyst and constraint

Campaign volumes remain elevated. For multi-segment names trading at a conglomerate discount, expect activists to push break-ups or sale processes as the cost of capital falls. Build your separability case before they do.

Three market paths to price

Baseline (most likely): 2025 finishes materially above 2024 on value; 2026 starts firm as regulatory guidance stabilizes and financing edges cheaper. Mix skews to mid-market breadth plus episodic megadeals in tech infra and energy.

Upside: Spreads compress, private credit goes bigger up-ticket, and 2026 tests a meaningfully higher run-rate with a larger share of $10B+ prints.

Downside: Policy shock—FSR assertiveness, outbound scope creep, or tariff volatility—stretches cross-border timelines and pushes value back toward domestic tuck-ins.

(We will revise these scenarios as dockets and prints shift.)

What to actually do in the next 90 days

Front-load filings strategy. Build a parallel plan: U.S. merger control, CFIUS/outbound mapping, and FSR where relevant. Where remedies are obvious, pre-offer them.

Underwrite power in digital infra. Treat megawatts like a line-item asset; diligence procurement, curtailment risk, and interconnect queues with the same rigor you apply to revenue quality.

Engineer dual outcomes. Price and paper for strategic or financial exits from day one—earn-outs, minority recaps, continuation options.

Blend capital for certainty. Lock a private-credit base you can live with; optimize in syndication if windows open.

Pre-empt the activist memo. Your deck should already answer “why now, why this perimeter, why this capital plan.” Don’t let an external whitepaper set your agenda.

FAQ (built for operators, sponsors, and event-driven desks)

1) What will drive the tape into year-end?
Financing and policy clarity. If rate guidance stays predictable and FSR/CFIUS calendars don’t surprise, the backlog clears in the mid-market while a handful of megadeals set the tone.

2) Why are values up but counts down?
The market is expressing conviction selectively—larger, more defensible deals are printing; marginal trades are waiting for cheaper money.

3) Which policy dials matter most to cross-border?
U.S. outbound scope and enforcement, inbound CFIUS mitigation trends, and EU FSR practice. Get those three wrong and your long-stop slips quarters.

4) Is private credit still supporting big tickets?
Yes—particularly as certainty of funds. Expect club equity + unitranche for $1B+ where timing is the edge.

5) Where is sector leadership most durable into 2026?
Data infrastructure/cyber and energy/grid-adjacent. Both have structural demand and identifiable constraints (power and permitting) that favor scaled buyers.

6) How should we treat AI-heavy targets in diligence?
Map data provenance and rights, evaluate vendor lock-in, model power/latency economics if infra-adjacent, and document safety/incident posture. Write the memo like you expect a second request.

The Altss angle—how teams turn this into execution

Mandate timing. Know which buyers and co-sponsors are in-window—by sector, check size, and region—before you staff a bake-off.
Warm paths. Surface advisor and syndicate overlaps so outreach starts warm and contextual.
OSINT signals. Altss ingests filings, dockets, hiring, portfolio moves, and budget actions to flag intent before a banker pitch hits your inbox.
Continuously refreshed decision-makers. Outreach-ready profiles, updated on a ≤30-day cadence, so you’re dealing with today’s org chart, not last quarter’s.

Altss pricing: $15,500/year. Purpose-built for capital formation and deal origination—signal over noise.

See how Altss aligns your capital formation.