The more than $52 billion worth of deals announced yesterday made it the busiest "merger Monday" this year.
Two large US corporate takeovers underscored increasing interest in pursuing transformational transactions to boost growth and cut costs.
Dish Network, the number two US satellite television provider, made a $25.5 billion bid for Sprint Nextel Corp, challenging the proposed acquisition of Sprint by Japan's SoftBank Corp.
Thermo Fisher Scientific also struck a $13.6 billion deal to buy Life Technologies Corp.
Meanwhile, US investment firm Royalty Pharma sweetened its bid for Elan to as much as $7.3 billion, formalising its initial approach.
The day's slew of announced transactions brought the value of global mergers and acquisitions so far this year to $650.2 billion, up 14.5% from $568.1 billion during the same time last year, according to Thomson Reuters data.
US companies accounted for more than half of that activity, with $331 billion worth of deals up to April 15, up from the 32% share the same time last year, when deal volumes in the country totaled $181.9 billion.
"If you're a well-capitalised company, one that has cash and access to capital, and if you have strategic imperatives, now is going to be looked at as a very compelling time to acquire," said Paul Parker, head of global corporate finance and M&A at Barclays.
''Volatility has come down meaningfully, interest rates are low, corporate cash levels are high and dilutive just sitting unproductively on balance sheets, and there is pent-up strategic demand. This is why we are seeing industry and company transforming deals,'' he added.
The first four months of the year already saw several large corporate deals, including the $23.2 billion takeover of ketchup maker HJ Heinz by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway and Brazilian private equity firm 3G Capital.
Other large deals include the $24.4 billion bid to take Dell private by founder Michael Dell and buyout firm Silver Lake Partners, as well as the merger of US Airways Group and AMR Corp, the bankrupt parent of American Airlines.
However, European deal activity is down 23%to $138.4 billion, while Asia-Pacific saw a 10% decline in deal volumes to $91.4 billion, the data showed.
Mondays are often active days for merger news because companies tend to finalise terms of a deal over the weekend and then roll out the announcement before the market opens on Monday.
