H1 2025 Canadian Private Equity Market Overview (CVCA)

Summary

• Total private equity investment reached $30.9B across 322 deals in H1 2025, already surpassing the full-year 2024 total.p.5
• Quebec recorded $18.3B across 192 deals, representing 60% of all PE transactions, while Ontario secured $12.5B across 74 deals.p.5
• 5 mega deals ($500M+) raised nearly $26.9B in H1 2025, yet 85% of deals with disclosed values were under $25M.p.4
• Buyouts and add-ons totalled $7.2B across 91 deals in H1 2025.p.8
• Minority investments totalled $947M across 82 deals, with dollars invested down 34% year-over-year.p.9
• Exits were subdued: $1.8B realized across 22 exits, with no IPOs and M&A accounting for 77% of exits and 92% of dollars realized.p.15
• Mega-deals represented 2% of deals but 87% of total capital invested, and 92% of disclosed deals were valued below $100M.p.6

Key insights

1. H1 2025 deal value surpassed 2024 ($27B across 669 deals) and the previous record set in 2014 ($30.3B).p.4
2. Industrial & Manufacturing led in deal volume with 95 transactions totaling $2.1B, followed by ICT with 58 deals.p.10
3. Automotive & Transportation and Financial sectors secured $3.4B and $1.5B respectively despite fewer deals.p.10
4. The average deal size rose to $95.82M, a 279% increase compared to the same period in 2024.p.6
5. ICT recorded 58 deals totaling $674M, with dollars invested down 73.5% versus the five-year H1 average.p.12
6. Consumer & Retail secured $501M across 31 deals, with an average deal size of $16.16M.p.13
7. Life Sciences deals totalled $663M across 30 deals, averaging $22.1M per deal.p.14
8. Industrial & Manufacturing accounted for 29.5% of all deals but only 6.7% of total dollars invested.p.11
9. Q2 2025 saw 179 deals totaling $12.6B, a 25% increase in deal count over Q1.p.6
10. Ontario and Quebec together accounted for 99.6% of PE dollars invested and 83% of all deals.p.5