Goldman Sachs has advised on more than $1 trillion of mergers and acquisitions in record time, highlighting the return of blockbuster dealmaking. We explain what&#x27;s driving the surge in investment banking activity, why AI is fuelling both M&amp;A and IPOs, and what it means for markets. We also break down the growing crisis at Thames Water, why nationalisation is back on the table, and how years of private equity ownership led to one of the UK&#x27;s biggest corporate challenges. Finally, we analyse Snap&#x27;s dramatic decline from a $130 billion company to under $10 billion, why its founder-led governance matters, and whether its bet on augmented reality glasses can ever pay off. (00:00) Coming Up (02:32) Goldman Sachs Hits $1 Trillion (06:08) M&amp;A League Tables 1H26 (09:08) IPO Markets Returns (17:29) What Next for M&amp;A (19:11) Thames Water Explained (24:32) Special Administration Regime (32:27) Can Thames Water Be Saved? (36:54) Snap&#x27;s $120B Collapse (40:07) The Founder Control Problem (45:24) Does ESG Still Matter?

Goldman Sachs Breaks M&A Records | Investment Banking Boom | Snap's $120B Collapse

Market Maker

# Full Transcript

**Podcast:** Market Maker

## Participants

- **Stephen** (None)
- **Ant** (None)

## Transcript

Hello and welcome back to this week's Market Maker Podcast. And this week we are talking about record breakers, burst water pipes and seismic product flops. And yes, the S word might get a cheeky mention. That's SpaceX as the S word, by the way. And first on the docket is going to be Goldman Sachs with a record breaking first half of M&A deals advising on over $1 trillion of deals so far this year.

Quite incredible. We'll also take a look at why MS and GS bankers decided to wear green shoes on the floor of the NYSE last week. Next then after that we'll look at the debacle that is Thames Water. 16 million Brits use it every day. So what's gone wrong? And will it finally be nationalized? And yes, we'll probably mention the B word. That's Burnham, by the way, for those who thought I was

going to say something else. Andy Burnham, the odds on favorite, of course, to become the new prime minister. And then finally, the curious case of Snap. Almost a billion monthly active users, still got a billion monthly active users, but a market cap that's fallen from highs of $130 billion to just over $7 billion today. Part of that company's founder-friendly governance structure

is what we're going to look at. But the other is the founder's obsession with augmented reality glasses, of which we had a pair in 2018, I believe, in the office that we actually gave to one of the interns on a night out. And then we played it back in hyperspeed and made a clip out of it. It was, I thought it was quite good, actually. But yeah, we're going to talk about that as well. So Stephen,

how are you holding up in the heat? Okay, I hope. Yeah, absolutely. So this is the back end of the heat wave over in Britain, I think by the time this podcast goes out. The heat wave would have broken, let's hope so. And Ant, because he is a professional, a consumer professional, he gets on the call and tells me to turn off my fan to avoid background noise. So either you get some background noise and a non-sweaty podcast presenter, or you're going to get a pretty sweaty podcast presenter in the next 40

minutes. People want the authenticity in the new AI world we live in. So when I see those beads of sweat, I know this is legit. Yeah, exactly. I get passionate about this stuff as well. Okay, so GS, trillion dollars on your notes. Tell me more. Yeah, so this is Goldman Sachs, the big beast. It announced or it is known that Goldman Sachs

has advised on $1 trillion worth of M&A deals before the middle of June. Now, this is the fastest to get to a trillion dollars of advice for any bank ever. It beat its own previous record of $1 trillion, which was achieved by mid-July. And that was back in 2021. So it's a whole month faster than that.

And the interesting thing is whenever we teach M&A and we say, look, you know, we have the kind of stack bar chart and we say, this is what M&A dea...

Goldman Sachs Breaks M&A Records | Investment Banking Boom | Snap's $120B Collapse

Transcript

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Goldman Sachs Breaks M&A Records | Investment Banking Boom | Snap's $120B Collapse

Transcript

Built for investment professionals

Every day you wait, your competitors are findingedge in conversations you're not hearing.

Every day you wait, your competitors are finding
edge in conversations you're not hearing.