Deals of the Year 2011: Glencore

That same Glencore IPO was another landmark transaction last year – a high-water mark for the IPO market that otherwise endured a traumatic 2011. And trauma can play strange tricks on the memory. The head of investment banking at a lead bank on the deal, which priced in May 2011, looks back at it now across the barren deal-making wasteland in the second half of last year and recalls a golden age. "Thank goodness we had such a good first half and got a lot of deals done, Glencore most notable of all, because the result is that our full-year numbers won’t look so bad despite what then followed."