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Skadden Tops The World in M&A Advisements

Thompson Reuters’ quarterly study of worldwide mergers and acquisitions shows Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom had the best first half of the year advising on 82 deals worth $137 billion.

Skadden secured top deals in telecoms and media to regain the top spot it held at the end of 2009. However, Skadden’s market share did decrease by more than 8 percentage points to 12.8 percent since the first half of 2009.

Among Skadden’s deals was the second-largest of the six-month period, U.S. phone operator CenturyLink’s $22 billion acquisition of Quest Communications International Inc., according to a Reuters press release.

Skadden is also representing News Corp’s proposed $13.7 billion bid for British satellite broadcaster BSkyB.

Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton jumped to 2nd from 17th place for the first half of the year after advising on 57 deals worth $111 billion.

Jones Day had the heaviest volume with 175 transactions worth $50.8 billion.

The number of global deals rose 3.8 percent from the first half of last year, while their value jumped 9.4 percent, taking the total to $1.1 trillion — the strongest opening six month period for global deals since 2008.

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