The two deals accounted for 6 per cent of the total raised, with Aramco alone accounting for 15 per cent of global IPO volumes.
"The pendulum has swung much more towards discipline. Companies don't need to be profitable but there is much greater focus on the unit economics of a business," she said, referring to the underlying profitably of a company's core business. In Europe just US$23.8 billion was raised, a 43.4 per cent slide from 2018 and the lowest volume in seven years, leaving the United States as the only major region to top last year's IPO volumes.
"Increasingly, issuers and vendors have the opportunity to delay their IPOs ... and give them another 1-2 years in the private market," said James Fleming, co-head of global equity capital markets at Citi.