Acquisitions in the utility sector and a major cross-border pipeline transaction helped drive the volume of Canadian M&A activity up 48 percent in the first quarter of 2016, even though the number of deals declined. Thomson Reuters data released on Thursday showed the overall number of deals in the period fell 18 percent to 511 from a year earlier, while the deal value surged to $67.9 billion from $45.9 billion a year ago.