Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A)
Also called: M&A, mergers and acquisitions, takeover
M&A is the buying, selling and combining of companies. The academic record is unflattering: most large acquisitions fail to create value for the buyer's shareholders, because the premium paid transfers the upside to the seller before any synergies arrive. The deals that do work tend to be small, adjacent and operationally boring — which is the opposite of the ones that get announced with a stage.
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