单选题 Companies have embarked on what looks like the beginnings of a re-run of the mergers and acquisitions (M&A) wave that defined the second bubbly half of the 1990s. That period, readers might recall, was characterized by a collective splurge that saw the creation of some of the most indebted companies in history, many of which later went bankrupt or were themselves broken up. Wild bidding for telecoms, internet and media assets, not to mention the madness that was Daimler's $40 billion motoring takeover in 1998-1999 of Chrysler or the Time-Warner/AOL mega-merger in 2000, helped to give mergers a thoroughly bad name. A consensus emerged that M&A was a great way for investment banks to reap rich fees, and a sure way for ambitious managers to betray investors by trashing the value of their shares.
Now M&A is back. Its return is a global phenomenon, but it is perhaps most striking in Europe, where so far this year there has been a stream of deals worth more than $600 billion in total, around 40% higher than in the same period of 2004. The latest effort came this week when France's Saint-Gobain, a building-materials firm, unveiled the details of its￡3.6 billion ($6.5 billion) hostile bid for BPB, a British rival. In the first half of the year, cross-border activity was up threefold over the same period last year. Even France Telecom, which was left almost bankrupt at the end of the last merger wave, recently bought Amena , a Spanish mobile operator.
Shareholder's approval of all these deals raises an interesting question for companies everywhere, are investors right to think that these mergers are more likely to succeed than earlier ones? There are two answers. The first is that past mergers may have been judged too harshly. The second is that the present rash of European deals does look more rational, but-and the caveat is crucial-only so far. The pattern may not hold.
M&A 's poor reputation stems not only from the string of spectacular failures in the 1990s, but also from studies that showed value destruction for acquiring shareholders in 80% of deals. But more recent studies by economists have introduced a note of caution. Investors should look at the number of deals that succeed or fail (typically measured by the impact on the share price), rather than (as you might think) weighing them by size. For example, no one doubts that the Daimler-Chrysler merger destroyed value. The combined market value of the two firms is still below that of Daimler alone before the deal. This single deal accounted for half of all German M&A activity by value in 1998 and 1999, and probably dominated people's thinking about mergers to the same degree. Throw in a few other such monsters and it is no wonder that broad studies have tended to find that mergers are a bad idea. The true picture is more complicated.

单选题 According to the text, a collective opinion on the mergers and acquisitions also concentrates on ______.

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】[考点解析] 本题是一道细节题，测试考生准确识别和理解原文重要信息的能力。本题的答案信息来源在第一段的尾句，该句的大意是:“一种共识出现了，即:合并和收购是投资银行获取丰厚费用的绝佳方式，也是有野心的管理人员通过废弃股份价值出卖投资人的万全之法”。从此句可以推断大家的共识集中在“获取大量费用”和“废弃股份价值”这两方面，故本题的正确选项应该是B“value destruction”(价值破坏)。

单选题 "The pattern" in the third paragraph most probably denotes ______.

【正确答案】 D

【答案解析】[考点解析] 这是一道细节推导题。测试考生准确识别和理解原文相关信息的能力。本题的答案信息来源在第三段的倒数第一、二句。第三段倒数第一句是本题题干核心词语在原文中出现的位置；第三段倒数第二句则是“the pattern”(型式)所指代的具体内容。第三段倒数第二句的大意是:“第二种答案是:目前欧洲合并和收购的大量涌现看起来的确更理性，但是只是就目前而言”。第三段尾句的大意是:“这种貌似理性的合并和收购的说法也许站不住脚”。由此可以推断本题的正确选项应该是D“the seeming rationality of the lastest cycle of European mergers”(最近欧洲合并似乎合理性)。考生在阅读时一定要注意原文中上下句之间的关系，以免造成误解。

单选题 The case of Daimler-Chrysler is employed in the text as ______.

【正确答案】 A

【答案解析】[考点解析] 这是一道细节题，测试考生识别和理解上下句之间关系的能力。本题的答案信息来源在尾段，尤其是尾段的第三、四句，关键在于第三句，其大意是:“投资者不要只考虑合并和收购的规模，相反应该考虑合并和收购成功或失败的数量”。此句主要阐述投资者的权衡标准，故本题的正确选项应该是A“an illustration of an evaluation criterion”(举例说明评估的标准)。考生在阅读时要重视上下句之间的关系，以免造成答题时的时间浪费。

单选题 The conclusion reached by general researches is that mergers are not ______.

单选题 According to the text, the author would agree that ______.

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[考点解析] 本题属于中心主旨题型，测试考生控制全篇、识别全文中心主旨的能力。本题答案的主要信息来源在第二段的第一、二句和第三段(尤其是第三段的倒数第一、二句)。第二段的第一、二句表明欧洲的合并和收购进行的规模最大。第三段倒数第一、二句对欧洲目前的合并和收购提出了否定。由此可以推断出本题的正确选项是C“the lastest cycle of European mergers will not produce better results”(最近的欧洲合并不会产生较好的结果)。考生在阅读时一定要首先识别全文的中心主旨，以便控制全篇文章的整体构建和发展。