NEW YORK, April 14, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Axial, the online M&A platform connecting buyers and sellers of American small and medium-sized businesses, today released its Q1 2022 Lower Middle Market Investment Banking League Tables. Unlike traditional league tables, which typically rank firms based solely on deal volume and dollar volume, Axial league tables incorporate historically hidden deal process data that reveal insight into sell-side process selectivity, seller attractiveness, and overall deal management process efficacy.
Download the Q1 2022 Lower Middle Market Investment Banking League Tables
"The M&A markets diverged in Q1 2022, with global M&A deal volume down 20% overall since last year's record highs, whereas the lower middle market surged more than 25% as measured by GHI," says Peter Lehrman, founder and CEO of Axial. "This is just the latest data point to demonstrate that deal activity in the lower middle market isn't correlated with public markets or large cap M&A. It has its own unique set of drivers. Congratulations to Q1's Top 25 lower middle market investment banks for their strong results during this period."
New deals marketed by Axial members increased 26% year-over-year and a total of 930 investment banks brought deals to market via the Axial platform in Q1. The rate at which buyers pursued those transactions increased by 7% quarter-over-quarter as measured by Axial's Pursuit Rate metric, which quantifies buyer interest in private companies and reveals insight into the buying and selling forces that shape individual deals. Dealmakers marketed more than 2,000 deals via Axial in Q1 2022 with the average revenue of deals marketed by investment banks at $20.9M and an average EBITDA of $3.1M. From an industry standpoint, Industrial transactions led the way (29%), followed by Food & Hospitality (15%), Consumer Goods (12%), Technology (12%), and Business Services and Healthcare (both 8%).
"It is interesting to note that the Technology sector had the highest pursuit rate in Q1 with a pursuit rate of 10.6%," says Dani Forman, Director of Research at Axial. "The intense selloff and multiple compression of publicly traded technology companies in Q4 2021 is leading to a highly engaged private M&A environment for lower middle market technology companies. Buyers who were on the sidelines in much of 2020 and 2021 based on valuation concerns are re-engaging in the lower middle market."
Axial is the online M&A platform for buyers and sellers of American small and medium-sized businesses. The company's pioneering deal sourcing and deal marketing platform is trusted by professional buyers, M&A advisors, and business owners to source opportunities, assess the quality and reputation of buyers, and exchange critical deal information. A select list of transactions sourced and executed via the Axial platform can be found here. For more information on Axial, visit www.axial.net.
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Dani Forman, Director of Research
Axial | dani.forman@axial.net
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