IFR announces its 2010 award winners

The banking industry is in an unprecedented state of flux. And while it is impossible to say exactly how the financial system will look in, say, five years, one thing is certain: the world of finance is likely to be steered towards a safer place, as banks’ penchant for extreme leverage and excessive risk is reined in. “I don’t think we’ll see another banking crisis in our lifetime,” said Peter Nielsen, global head of markets at Royal Bank of Scotland. “Credit crises – of course. But, as with all crises, it’s the leverage that killed everyone....

Record low Treasury rates and cash-rich investors set the stage for a remarkable performance in the 2010 US dollar bond market. Compared with the uncertainty of the two previous years 2010 might be considered drama-free. But issuers and bookrunners continued to push the limits of what was possible, with records broken and capital structures reinvented. It took an investment bank with forethought, creativity and confidence to maintain the cutting edge in one of the world’s the most popular capital markets. JP Morgan was that bank, racking up...

It was Project Seaview, combining the issue of contingent capital notes and a £13.5bn rights issue, that put Lloyds Banking Group on an even keel ahead of the bank beginning its funding plan in 2010. The rights issue was one of the largest primary equity deals ever completed, so a strategy was required to complete the deal at a time when 15% of the bank’s equity was out on loan, illustrating a substantial level of shorting by investors. “We knew how much rights issue appetite there was, the question turned to how to structure it,” said Andrew...

More than three years after the onset of the financial crisis, any evaluation of the global banking industry – and the players within it – is still conditioned by the decisions made in the run-up to, and during, that cataclysm. So it is with Deutsche Bank. The bank’s remarkable performance in 2010 was determined by the shape it was in as the crisis hit and by the ruthless and prescient strategic decisions it took when competitors were either fighting to stay alive, or were paralysed in terror as the world collapsed around them. Clearly, some...

Looking back at the past year, it would be easy to summarise the events of 2010 as the global financial crisis Part 1 – the one created by financial market professionals, sleepy regulators, institutional investors and artificially low interest rates – giving way seamlessly to potentially an equally pernicious, tumultuous and damaging global financial crisis Part 2, this time created by profligate, over-indebted European sovereign governments. There’s something very disturbing about the notion of governments going bust; it undermines the sense...

Following the credit market turbulence of the previous two years, most banks were prepared for another bumpy ride in 2010. But none could have predicted the extent of the volatility that ravaged markets in the second quarter. Already struggling to second-guess the impact of a new regulatory regime for over-the-counter derivatives, credit traders faced yet another crisis as concerns surrounding debt-laden eurozone sovereigns escalated. Credit spreads reached new highs and liquidity new lows. Against this backdrop, 2010 threatened to derail...

Morgan Stanley secured top ranking in EMEA for the third consecutive year for structured equity issuance and maintained relevance across the other regions with a clutch of innovative and well executed deals. Notably, the bank also displayed a level of co-operation across regions that competitors often lack. London-listed Indian firm Vedanta required teams in Asia and Europe to work together seamlessly to produce a successful visit to the CB market for the company as it raised US$883m, while the European team recognised that for South African...

Morgan Stanley certainly did not emerge from the financial crisis unscathed, though it did use the near-death experience to its advantage to re-invent itself. In what was a year of transition, a newly installed management led by CEO James Gorman helped shape the firm’s future by expanding its brokerage and trading operations, and selling off non-core assets in response to unprecedented regulatory reform. It was a difficult year in the US equity markets, with the overall volume of equity issuance in the US falling from the record-high level of...

No one would ever really mistake the principals of Evercore Partners’ restructuring group for new kids on any block. The co-heads of the group, Bill Repko and David Ying, have been building their reputations as go-to guys for troubled companies for 30 years. Evercore founder Roger Altman gave them the platform to work together, hiring Repko and Ying in 2005. Daniel Celentano joined in 2008. In the wake of the Lehman Brothers collapse, the team would manage three of the largest restructuring assignments in history, including General Motors,...

The year kicked off with renewed confidence that activity in the US investment grade loan market would pick up. Market sentiment was positive, and players were hopeful of a recovery. Soon enough, activity improved and spreads compressed. Market participants even started asking themselves if new deals resembled the daring structures of 2006. That renewed confidence was dented in April, however, as sovereign debt fears in Europe trickled to the US. Concerns over Basel III hampered the recovery, as the market pondered how regulations would...

The widespread public and political opprobrium directed towards banks for their contribution to the global recession has failed to dent London’s status as the world’s leading financial centre. At least, that is one interpretation of the eighth Global Financial Centres Index, published in September. It ranks London as the top financial centre with 772 points, nosing ahead of New York. With its time-zone, language, established market and until recently, light-touch regulation, London remains hard to beat. However, the GFCI also shows that...

There were bigger deals this year, and deals that were more difficult to get done. But no deal summed up the spirit of 2010 in the high-grade bond market better, or set the pace for other issuers more, than Wal-Mart’s US$3bn three-part trade. It set off a spate of deals that would dominate the rest of the year. Other highly rated investment grade corporations sought out the low-cost bond market, even if they had no imminent need for the money. Wal-Mart shoppers will attest that the company knows something about bargains. As an issuer it brought...