Private equity deal value in May up 29% YOY

Global private equity and venture capital deal value in May grew 29.2% to $61.73 billion from $47.56 billion in the same month in 2023, S&P Global Market Intelligence data shows.

The number of deals, meanwhile, declined to 933 from 1,086.

– Download a spreadsheet with data in this story. – Read about private equity entries in April. – Read about US-backed funding rounds in China.

Deal value year to date totaled $251.11 billion, up 17.9% year over year. The number of deals went down to 4,988 from 5,451 in May 2023.

The US and Canada had the highest deal value in May, securing $31.65 billion, compared with $24.51 billion in the same month a year ago.

Private equity-backed investments in Europe soared to $24.99 billion from $10.68 billion year over year, while deal value in Asia-Pacific dropped 58.4% to $4.55 billion.

The technology, media and telecom sector saw the most deal activity, with 335 private equity-backed announced transactions in May.

Within the sector, application software tallied the highest number of transactions at 145, followed by IT consulting and other services with 31 deals and interactive media and services with 26.

Mega-deals

During May, 13 deals with transaction values of at least $1 billion were recorded.

In the biggest transaction of the month, Energy Capital Partners LLC and co-investors agreed to buy sustainable infrastructure company Atlantica Sustainable Infrastructure PLC for $7.87 billion in transaction value.

The month's biggest funding round involved AI company X.AI Corp., which raised $6 billion in a series B round. Firms including Valor Management LLC, Vy Capital, Andreessen Horowitz LLC and Sequoia Capital Operations LLC participated in the round.