Utilities, energy, and mining were the most active sectors in Canada’s mergers and acquisitions market over 2025, according to the “Canada's Q4 2025 M&A Landscape” report published by Bennett Jones.
Thirty-eight utilities-related deals totalling US$72.14 billion were recorded in the past year, while the energy sector recorded 122 deals totalling US$62.11 billion. The mining industry listed 803 deals – the highest volume across all sectors – amounting to US$61.23 billion.
The combined deal value for the three sectors is US$195.48 billion – over half of the total Canadian M&A value in 2025. Bennett Jones attributed the heightened activity in these industries to the digital asset focus and significant demand for energy and infrastructure resources; over US$61 billion went into data center M&A and investment worldwide.
By deal value, REITs, insurance, and health care equipment and services were the poorest-performing industries, with values of US$10.05 billion, US$12.55 billion, and US$14.26 billion, respectively.
Despite economic uncertainty and challenges, inbound M&A rose, with deal value increasing from US$49.19 billion in 2024 to US$98.45 billion in 2025, even though deal volume was slightly down. The aggregate value of announced or completed Canadian M&A deals in 2025 was US$389.69 billion.
Transaction value in the third quarter of 2025 was US$131 billion – the highest three-month tally since 2020’s fourth quarter, per S&P Global Market Intelligence. Nonetheless, the M&A market continues to battle regulatory scrutiny, tariff uncertainty, and economic and political instability.
Large cap deals
The Canadian M&A market largely leaned on high-value strategic deals in the past year. S&P Global data revealed that the increase in Canadian companies making acquisitions in publicly announced or completed M&A deals worth at least US$1 billion was the prevailing trend in 2025, with the volume of such deals rising by 62 percent.
The large-cap M&A trend was spurred by strategic consolidation among large corporations, favourable financing conditions from declining interest rates, and heightened private equity investment driven by abundant undeployed capital. Many high-value deals involved the energy, natural resources, financial services and infrastructure sectors, such as the US$3.8 billion acquisition of NuVista Energy by Ovintiv and British Columbia Investment Management Corporation's £1.0 billion take-private acquisition of BBGI Global Infrastructure S.A.
Such transactions are being structured to prepare for and minimize the impact of external challenges. Moreover, the modified Investment Canada Act introduces deal protections tackling new risk profiles for potential national security reviews. The protections also address tariff-related concerns.