IFR Awards dinner raises £1.4m for charity

2 min read

The IFR Awards Gala Dinner returned to the Grosvenor House hotel in London on Monday evening with HRH The Princess Royal once again in attendance and more than £1.4m raised for Save the Children.

It was the first IFR gala dinner since January 2020 and was attended by more than 650 guests, many attending such a large event for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic began. Vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence accompanied Her Royal Highness.

The return of the traditional IFR tombstone auction in aid of long-standing charity partner Save the Children was particularly welcome considering events around the world and was met with enthusiastic support from the banks, companies and individuals present.

HRH The Princess Royal, Patron of Save the Children, gave a speech on the charity's work before Jonny Gould returned to host the auction. Gould's relentless encouragement to the audience across eight minutes secured donations of £1,406,477, the highest since 2011 and including a record number of personal pledges.

HRH The Princess Royal delivers a speech on the work of Save the Children. Credit: Anna Gordon/Save the Children

The evening was hosted by comedian and actor Marcus Brigstocke and the awards were presented by IFR editor Matthew Davies.

Her Royal Highness presented the Bank of the Year trophy to Jim Esposito, co-head of the investment banking division of Goldman Sachs. That was one of six trophies collected by the US bank, which also secured the bookrunner slot on the tombstone with a donation of £600,000.

Citigroup donated £200,000 and BNP Paribas contributed £150,000, and were named senior lead managers on the tombstone.

Donations from M Klein and Company, Societe Generale and Credit Agricole made them joint lead managers.

Co-lead managers were HSBC, Lucid Group, Morgan Stanley, Siebert Williams Shank, Barclays, IFR via LSEG Foundation and Royal Bank of Canada.

The final tier of donors were Zuercher Kantonalbank, Deutsche Bank, Nomura, SIX Group, SMBC Nikko, Allfunds Bank, MUFG and KM Capital Markets.

Hundreds of individuals made donations, taking total funding to Save the Children through IFR Awards dinners to more than £30.7m since 1995.

Champagne receptionFrederic Zorzi, Charlotte Conlan and Simon Jones of BNP ParibasJim Esposito, Goldman Sachs

Jonny Gould hosts the IFR charity tombstone

Click here for more photos from the night.