Deals
M&A Snaps Back as BHP, Intel Drive Busiest Quarter in 2 Years
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Dealmaking staged a comeback in the third quarter, with a jump in multibillion-dollar takeovers putting this year on pace to surpass 2009.
The quarter was the busiest in two years, with $562.6 billion of announced transactions, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. BHP Billiton Ltd. made an unsolicited $40 billion offer for Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan Inc., Sanofi-Aventis SA began its pursuit of Genzyme Corp. for at least $18.5 billion, and Intel Corp. announced its largest acquisition, the $7.7 billion takeover of security-software maker McAfee Inc.