AstraZeneca's (LON:AZN) purchase this month of a stake in cancer drug developer Acerta Pharma was perhaps a final salvo in a year, which has seen plenty of deal-making in the UK and record merger and acquisition (M&A) activity in the USA.
The pharma sector has been particularly active (but not exclusively), and there have been record mega deals - such as Pfizer's eye-watering US$155bn takeover of Allergan last month to create the globe's biggest drugmaker.
Other notables are brewer Anheuser-Busch InBev of Belgium acquiring SABMiller of the UK and Shell's planned takeover of BG (LON:BG.) to be completed next year.
Such deals certainly seem to signal full steam ahead for M&A but opinion is divided as to whether this knock-out pace will continue into 2016.
In the UK for example, there has been activity but certainly not on the same scale as in the US and in the third quarter to September 30, deals involving UK companies continued to be at a lower level than before the economic crisis of 2008.
There were 72 completed deals involving a change of majority share ownership compared to 112 in the second quarter.
Chris Beauchamp, a market analyst at IG Index in London, believes there is now a note of caution sounding in the market, and does not expect the same momentum in 2016 for M&A either here or across the pond.
"We've had a long, long period of cheap money, and low borrowing costs and US firms especially are sitting on plenty of cash because they are not sure what to do with it - they can't chuck it all away on dividends and buy-backs."
Valuations are now starting to look a little more stretched, he suggests, and the recent Fed rate rise also signals a clear move away, albeit gradual, from ultra-cheap money.
"Memories of 2007 do linger and no-one wants to be making hefty acquisitions at the top of the market," he says.
Conversely, experts at Ernst & Young see no end in sight to strong M&A activity - at least in the US in the near term anyway. It says 57% of US companies have three or more deals in their pipeline compared to just 10% of companies six months ago.
"US targeted M&A continues to dominate, attracting record values last seen in 2007. While the top megadeals garnered most of the attention, there was robust activity in the upper-middle market too and that is expected to continue in 2016,” says Rich Jeanneret, the group's vice chair of transaction advice services.
Meanwhile, Matt Porzio, writing in Forbes Investing, says: "...don’t expect a sea change in M&A. Fed funds and interest rates along the entire yield curve will have to rise quite a bit more before the central bank’s action has any major impact on the booming mergers and acquisitions market."
He adds: "With the fed funds target rate near zero, an increase, even several, will still leave interest rates near historically low levels," pointing to the Fed's indication that it plans a gradual rise.
Other analysts expect less megadeals but lots of smaller transactions, as bigger firm sell non-core assets and smaller ones consider tie-ups to stay competitive.
"While the absolute dollar value of deals could very well decline in 2016, we expect the number of deals to increase year-on-year as the market broadens and we see more mid-sized transactions," Gary Posternack, global head of M&A at Barclays, has been quoted as saying.
So if there is to be continued deal making in 2016, where is it likely to be?
Big pharma is certainly an area to look out for as it grapples with the problems of drugs expiring and pipelines running out. AstraZeneca's deal above, for example, was a way of getting its hands on a potential cancer blockbuster. It also offers pharma firms a way of diversifying and beefing up the armoury.
Beauchamp reckons big oilers like BP (LON:BP.) and Shell (LON:RDSB) may use spare capacity to pick up smaller projects and companies at distressed prices on the back of the bargain basement crude price.
Miners have less legroom and can't buy each other, but could make use of the commodity price pressure to pick up more ground cheaply, he suggests.
In telecoms, investors have been awaiting for what seems like yonks for a possible megadeal between Vodafone (LON:VOD) and Liberty Global and recent improved performance from Vodafone in Europe has reignited hopes.
Also, in October this year, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) provisionally cleared BT’s anticipated acquisition of EEE, allowing the tie-up to move forwards.
British iconic engineer Rolls Royce (LON:RR.) has had well-documented financial troubles and the government holds a so -called golden share. Could 2016 be the year Rolls starts turning the wheel towards a part tie-up with BAE Systems (LON:BAE.) some may ask.
In the US, particularly active sectors next year are thought to include technology, life sciences, healthcare, oil and gas and financial services.
However, Ernst & Young's Jeanneret adds: "While appetites remain high, executives will continue to exert patience and walk away from deals with too many risk factors. Companies will seek opportunities outside of their industry sector in the search for new growth and innovation."
In the UK Office for Budget Responsibility's (OBR) November 2015 economic and fiscal outlook, business investment grew strongly in the first two quarters of 2015 and is expected to grow by 6.1% over this year as a whole.
Bank lending to non-financial companies remained subdued however, with the growth in net lending to small and medium-sized enterprises turning positive in the year.
So M&A is certainly likely to be a big theme of the New Year, along with further Fed rate moves and the question of whether the BoE will follow suit, but the question of the extent of deal making remains open.