Merger madness -- Deal activity doubled in first half, report finds

Acquisition activity reached nearly $1 trillion in the first half of 2014, the largest total since before the Great Recession ravaged the global economy, and a hot tech market in Silicon Valley along with consolidation trends in other sectors is likely to keep cash flowing.

US companies announced $982 billion in mergers and acquisitions during the first six months of 2014. That's nearly double the $570 billion recorded in the same period in 2013 and the most since the first half of 2007, just ahead of the collapse of the U.S. economy. Surprisingly, the total value of deals in 2014 shot up while the number of mergers and acquisitions was steady from the first half of 2013, showing the trend toward mega-mergers with high price tags, such as Facebook committing $16 billion for mobile-messaging service WhatsApp and Google picking up Nest Labs for $3.2 billion.

Prominent Silicon Valley acquisitions have been dwarfed by giant consolidation in the communications industry -- Comcast has agreed to buy Time Warner Cable for $45 billion and AT&T is attempting to take over DirectTV for $48.5 billion -- as deals of more than $10 billion accounted for almost half the total.