The Public Mandate Register: Investment Banks in European Defence M&A
Who appears in the official paper trail of European defence consolidation
European defence consolidation is visible in assets, platforms and strategic-industrial policy, but the advisory infrastructure behind those transactions is harder to measure. This report treats that infrastructure as an evidentiary problem. It identifies which investment banks are publicly attributed as financial advisers in European defence and strategic dual-use M&A, using only primary or official transaction sources. The governing rule is deliberately strict: no public attribution, no league-table credit.
The report is structured around the construction and interpretation of a public mandate register. It first defines the evidentiary standard, the admissible source hierarchy and the distinction between principal M&A advice, fairness opinions, cash confirmation, financing and capital-markets roles. It then maps the eligible deal universe, analyses recurring bank appearances by deal side, industrial segment and jurisdiction, and closes by explaining what the visible advisory record reveals about the financial infrastructure of European defence consolidation.