What not to do in M&A:
Expand in a market that many think has peaked. Pay a huge premium to expand in said industry Roughly double your debt load to fund that expensive price tag.
Or, you could be like American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings Inc. and do all three of those things. On Thursday, the maker of axles and crankshafts for pickup trucks announced it was going to acquire car-parts supplier Metaldyne Performance Group Inc. for $3.3 billion, including the assumption of $1.7 billion in net debt.
