NEW YORK, Feb. 13, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- S&P Capital IQ today announced the launch of Deal Detector, part of a series of innovative research and commentary aimed at meeting the changing needs of today's investor.

The new report, created by S&P Capital IQ's Global Markets Intelligence (GMI) team, identifies companies that have valuation metrics and fundamentals similar to firms that have already been targeted for acquisition.

"With worldwide merger and acquisition volume exceeding more than $2.6 trillion last year, the pace of deal making saw its best year since 2007," said Richard Peterson, Director, S&P Capital IQ and editor of Deal Detector. "  In that light, GMI offers Deal Detector reports to help identify companies that possess financial characteristics of recent M&A deals which may become potential takeover candidates."

Deal Detector is designed to alert investors to potential investment ideas ahead of prospective M&A announcements, and uncovers sector and industry trends in M&A activity. There is no set time horizon for each idea, and this differentiates it from traditional research, which is typically based on a 12-month forward time period.

Deal Detector and other GMI commentary, including Trade Detector and Consensus Earnings, are available on the S&P Capital IQ platform.

S&P Capital IQ's Global Markets Intelligence Research is an innovation-focused analytic team tasked with identifying pricing and valuation inefficiencies for the benefit of S&P Capital IQ customers. This is modelled after the research apparatus typically only found at exclusive private multi-asset class money managers

About S&P Capital IQ

S&P Capital IQ, a part of McGraw Hill Financial (NYSE:MHFI), is a leading provider of multi-asset class and real time data, research and analytics to institutional investors, investment and commercial banks, investment advisors and wealth managers, corporations and universities around the world. S&P Capital IQ provides a broad suite of capabilities designed to help track performance, generate alpha, and identify new trading and investment ideas, and perform risk analysis and mitigation strategies. Through leading desktop solutions such as the S&P Capital IQ, Global Credit Portal and MarketScope Advisor desktops; enterprise solutions such as S&P Capital IQ Valuations; and research offerings, including Leveraged Commentary & Data, Global Markets Intelligence, and company and funds research, S&P Capital IQ sharpens financial intelligence into the wisdom today's investors need. For more information visit: www.spcapitaliq.com.

SOURCE S&P Capital IQ