Success Factors in European Energy Mergers and Acquisitions - An Event Study

The main purpose of this thesis is to investigate the success factors of M&As in the European energy industry. Thus, the theoretical framework of this work covers both the structure of the European energy industry and the key success factors in M&As. In an event study analysis a total amount of 103 large-scale energy deals in the period between December 1996 and March 2008 are analysed. Acquirers that have been highly active in previous M&As show significantly lower stock returns around the announcement day, showing that shareholders do not value a bidder’s experience in large energy deals. We also find some empirical evidence for M&As of similarly sized entities to be more successful. Another major finding is that corporate transactions within a single, regulated market deliver significantly higher returns