Herbert Smith Freehills tops Australasian M&A League Tables

Herbert Smith Freehills has cemented its position as the leading legal advisor for Mergers and Acquisitions transactions in Australasia after topping three of the leading M&A legal advisor league tables for the first nine months of 2015.

The firm outperformed the competition in the Thomson Reuters, Mergermarket and Bloomberg league tables, ranking:

• 1st by both value and deal count of announced deals in Australia and New Zealand (Thomson Reuters)
• 1st by both value and deal count of completed deals in Australia and New Zealand (Thomson Reuters)
• 1st by both value and deal count of announced deals in Australasia (Mergermarket)
• 1st by both value and deal count of announced deals in Australia and New Zealand (Bloomberg)

Herbert Smith Freehills has acted on many of Australia’s largest, most complex and market-defining deals of 2015 including advising:

• Toll Group on its A$8 billion cross-border acquisition by Japan Post
• Swisse Wellness on the cross-border sale of an 83% interest in Swisse to Biostime International Holdings Ltd, valuing Swisse at A$1.67 billion
• Brookfield Infrastructure Partners on the proposed A$8.9 billion cross-border acquisition of Asciano Limited by way of scheme of arrangement
• Barrick Gold Corporation on the sale of gold assets in Australia and Papua New Guinea for $A1.2 billion
• Goodman Fielder on its acquisition by Wilmar International Limited and First Pacific Company Limited by way of a scheme of arrangement, which values Goodman Fielder at A$1.9 billion

The firm also continues to performing strongly in M&A across Asia Pacific. In other notable Thomson Reuters rankings, the firm ranked:

• 2nd by value of announced deals in Asia-Pacific (ex-Japan)
• 3rd by deal count of announced deals in Asia-Pacific (ex-Japan)