Merrill falls to No. 8 on M&A adviser rankings: Thomson

By Eleanor Wason

LONDON (Reuters) - Merrill Lynch & Co Inc MER.N lost out badly in the merger-and-acquisition adviser rankings for the first half of 2008, falling to No. 8 from No. 4 a year ago in one of the league table's biggest moves, Thomson Reuters data showed on Friday.

Merrill was involved in only three of the world's ten largest M&A deals since the start of January, according to preliminary data.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N) knocked Morgan Stanley (MS.N) off the league table's top spot, moving up from No. 2 after advising on a total of $593 billion worth of deals, including nine of the ten largest transactions.

Goldman worked on the top three deals -- Altria Group Inc's (MO.N) $113 billion spinoff of Philip Morris International Inc (PM.N), InBev NV's INTB.BR proposed $55.5 billion bid for Anheuser-Busch Cos Inc (BUD.N), and France Telecom SA's (FTE.PA) $47.8 billion planned offer for TeliaSonera AB (TLSN.ST).

Citigroup Inc (C.N) came in second, after ranking No. 3 a year earlier.

Morgan Stanley fell to fifth place from No. 1, partly because it missed out on the Philip Morris and InBev transactions and was involved in only four of the ten biggest deals worldwide.

JP Morgan was one of the big gainers. Due to work on Philip Morris and InBev it ranked No. 3 globally, up two places. In Europe, it shot up by six places to No. 2.

Deutsche Bank AG DBKG.n.DE also jumped higher, moving to fourth place from ninth place worldwide, in part on its recent appointment as an adviser to InBev on the Anheuser-Busch deal.