New Wave of Mergers and Acquisitions in Russia: Assessing Patterns

The paper is devoted to the analysis of mergers and acquisitions in Russian Federation after February 2022 and their causes. Particular attention is paid to transactions that are forced due to sanctions pressure. The paper provides a classification of M&A transactions, identifying the following subgroups of transactions, followed by a case study of illustrative examples for each of the subgroups: 1. Transfer of business to Russian private investors/management; 2. Transfer of business to investors from “friendly” countries; 3. Transfer of business to state management; 4. “Sham” transfer of business. Then we carried out a financial assessment of strategic transaction patterns for creating or destroying the company’s value on the example of the following companies: Renault-Nissan, Decathlon, Avito, Inditex. For this purpose, for each of the companies, a financial model of its operations for the period 2019-2033 was built. Further, a risk model that forecasts changes in EVA spread and EV, is built taking into account macroeconomic and market risks assessed using the Monte Carlo method. The results of the paper show that the pattern of value creation is inherent in transactions involving the transfer of business to Russian investors/management, while the other cases are characterized by the pattern of destruction of the company's value. Key words: M&A deals, "new wave" of M&A deals, patterns of company value creation and destruction, case analysis, enterprise value, EVA, EVA Spread, risk modeling, Monte Carlo modeling.