Lawyer Monthly - December 2021 Edition

We have almost come to the end of another extraordinary year. It is time to look back on the transaction trends that have defined 2021 – some optimistic and others concerning. There are signs that the SPAC surge witnessed at the beginning of the year may be seeing a resurgence after its earlier crash 1 , even as further reports emerge indicating a wave of distressed M&A opportunities 2 that has built over the past 18 months. The Financial Times has found 3 that 49% of the 43 IPOs that raised over $1 billion this year are now trading below their listed prices in spite of robust stock market activity worldwide. Some of the now underperforming companies include UK food delivery service Deliveroo, Indian payments giant Paytm and alternative food manufacturer Oatly. The figure stands in stark contrast to the 27% of $1 billion+ IPOs that listed in 2020 and went on to underperform by the end of their first 12 months of trading. On the M&A due diligence side, a new report from Aon 4 has found that ESG is now considered equally important to financials. The findings were derived from a survey of M&A experts and challenge the perception that financials are the sole overriding factor in due diligence and warn of the substantial adverse financial impact that poor ESG may have on financial returns. We look forward to sharing further data on the state of the M&A and IPO scene before the year is out for good. As ever, the following pages feature a record of some of the significant deals that have taken place in the past month, together with exclusive interviews with some of the legal advisors who worked on them. 1 https://www.ft.com/content/d1723a8e-c146-4d48-8475-01cc9947a5d6 2 https://www.financierworldwide.com/roundtable-distressed-ma-dec21 #.YaYBANDP3IU 3 https://www.ft.com/content/4c68c37b-57ae-47b1-98dd-f4a815b3182d 4 https://www.aon.com/emea/c-suite/mergers-and-acquisitions/default.aspx What’sHappening in theWorldof M&As and IPOs? 74 WWW.LAWYER-MONTHLY.COM DEC 2021