This thesis takes up a very acutely relevant topic: „Do M&A transactions in the European insurance sector create value in the short- and long-term?" After national consolidation of the European banking and insurance markets had p- gressed in the 2nd half of the 1990s, the recent years showed an increasing amount of cross-border M&A especially in the banking sector. This development is surprising in light of the M&A paradox, according to which the rate of successful bank transactions is very low, yet the number of size of completed transactions constantly increases. The current empirical evidence gives reason to devote a comprehensive a- demic analysis to M&A in the European insurance industry. Furthermore, research to this topic area shows a significant industry-specific gap and largely an absence of respective empirical studies. Research concerned with the overall success of European M&A transactions are extremely rare to date, and the state of knowledge on the success of cross-border transactions in the European - surance industry are very limited.