Evercore and Houlihan Lokey have emerged as the leading mergers and acquisitions (M&A) financial advisers in the financial services sector during the first half of 2025, according to GlobalData.

The analysis of GlobalData’s latest financial advisers league table shows that Evercore led by value, advising on $38.6bn worth of deals, while Houlihan Lokey led by volume, advising on 25 deals.

GlobalData lead analyst Aurojyoti Bose said: “Both Houlihan Lokey and Evercore registered year-on-year growth in terms of deal volume and value, respectively, in H1 2025 and their rankings by these metrics also showcased improvement.

“Houlihan Lokey had more than a double-fold jump in the total number of deals advised by it in H1 2025 compared to H1 2024, and its ranking by deal volume also improved from 12th to the top position during the period.

“Similarly, Evercore registered 23.3% growth in the total value of deals advised by it and went ahead from occupying the fifth position by value in H1 2024 to top the chart by this metric in H1 2025.

“The involvement in $24bn deal for the acquisition of Worldpay by Global Payments helped Evercore register a jump in deal value. Apart from leading by value, Evercore also held the eighth position by volume during H1 2025.”

The UK-based data and analytics company revealed that JP Morgan secured the second position in terms of deal value, advising on transactions worth $36.2bn.

Barclays followed with $31.8bn, Morgan Stanley with $30.9bn, and UBS with $29.1bn.

In terms of deal volume, Piper Sandler occupied the second position with 19 deals.

Stifel/KBW followed with 17 deals, JP Morgan with 14 deals, and UBS with 12 deals.

GlobalData’s league tables are based on the real-time tracking of thousands of company websites, advisory firm websites and other reliable sources available on the secondary domain. A dedicated team of analysts monitors all these sources to gather in-depth details for each deal, including adviser names.

To ensure further robustness to the data, the company also seeks submissions of deals from leading advisers.

"Evercore and Houlihan Lokey lead H1 2025 financial services M&A financial advisory rankings " was originally created and published by Private Banker International, a GlobalData owned brand.

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