The number of deals announced in East Anglia fell in the first quarter in line with national trends, although nationwide, the value of deals rose significantly. The volume of deals in the first quarter in the region fell to 40, from 64 in the period a year ago and the value of deals in the region dipped to £470 million from £871 million previously, according to figures from Experian.

Nationally, the total number of mergers, acquisitions, flotations, rights issues and placements announced during Q1 fell by 19.8 per cent. The number of deals announced fell to 944 in the first quarter from 1,177 a year ago. Scotland and the South West were the only regions to see deal volumes increase, up by 14.9 per cent and 14.1 per cent respectively. But the value of UK deals during Q1 saw a significant increase of 63 per cent largely due to Glencore International's acquisition of Xstrata for £39.1billion.

Wendy Driver, business development manager at Experian Corpfin, said: “Despite an overall fall in the volume of deal activity, two regions still managed to buck the trend and values in five of the UK regions were up, influenced mainly by the biggest deal ever in the mining and quarrying industry. It was also among the highest-valued transactions in UK corporate history. This highlights that firms are managing to find the funds to invest.”

There was a UK element in 49 per cent of all European transactions, up from 42 per cent. In terms of value, the UK contributed almost 63 per cent in the first quarter.