As war broke out in the Middle East, European equity sellers parted a red sea in stock markets to bank huge proceeds.

Between the evening of Friday 27 February and the end of Tuesday 3 March, four multi-billion-dollar transactions hit European screens – a huge glut of paper in the best of times – and a remarkable haul amid military escalation in the run-up to, and fallout following, US-Israeli strikes on Iran.

Given the market slide from relative patience to outright fear as crude oil has sustained its ceaseless run, rushing for the exit sign looks to have been a smart move. The major question is whether subsequent wannabe equity issuers have the nerve – and the market window – to execute in the coming days and weeks.

Perhaps it’s unsurprising that three of the biggest deals in this most recent flurry came from issuers rushing to secure M&A financing, given the need to raise capital for announced corporate actions – a theme flagged by ECM Pulse earlier in 2026.

France’s Engie, UK-listed Rosebank Industries, and Swiss giant Zurich Insurance priced accelerated transactions worth USD 3.5bn, USD 2.5bn, and just under USD 5bn, respectively.

The other multi-billion-dollar deal was a USD 3.2bn secondary sell-down in Naturgy, sold aftermarket on 3 March by BlackRock.

This deal was placed, as well as underwritten, by Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan, according to several market participants.

JPMorgan declined to comment on whether the Naturgy trade was underwritten; Goldman Sachs did not respond to requests for comment.

Dealogic: EMEA ECM, as of 4 March 2026

“It is amazing how much paper was brought given the war,” said an ECM investor. “To be honest, with some of them, we were pretty surprised the deals went ahead in such a bad market.”

“They all knew the risks around stocks, and I can’t imagine the books were all amazing, but I think perhaps in some cases there might have been client pressure to get things done while they could.”

Naturgy shares were trading 2.7% below the offer price as of the close on 5 March, though have pared losses and currently sit just 1% below strike. Engie and Zurich are trading down 7.7% and 4.4%, respectively, this morning (9 March) versus their offer prices.

Rosebank has broadly traded flat since its deal, with the stock down just 0.6% as of this morning.

“The trading hasn’t been great since these deals,” the investor noted. “A lot of these issuers pushed on size but didn’t really concede much on price.”

“But they were mostly in pretty defensive sectors, particularly utilities which has been shielded a little from the volatility, so the banks likely could have hedged any risk taken on.”

Taking a window

While some investors were grumbling over being flooded with paper at a time of heightened market turmoil, sell-side sources in the market on these deals reiterated it was the right thing to do.

“Nobody is obviously staring at a red screen and saying, ‘oh this is a great day to launch a deal,’” noted a banker close to one of the M&A-related capital raises. “But the intention was always to launch then, and it was pre-announced to fund M&A, so we were confident we could do it; there wasn’t a reason to wait.”

“There is a high chance this is going to drag on, so there was no guarantee markets were going to get much better any time soon.”

Dealmakers close to the three capital raises noted that there had been heavy wall-crossing around all three, with investors lining up to take part in funding accretive M&A.

Given primary raises are often skewed towards existing shareholders and longer-term institutional shareholders, many buysiders appear to have been happy to look beyond near-term volatility around the war in the Middle East and commit to the financing.

“We were substantially covered by long-only quality institutions before launch who backed the M&A story,” said one of the bankers. “People like the story and we were still in a good position to go.”

A third banker noted that sellers had little choice in many cases but to push through with their deals if possible.

“In the case of the M&A raises, because the deals have been pre-announced, it creates an overhang on the stock – now when you combine that with prolonged market volatility it can impact the economics of a deal,” the banker said.

“So, it wasn’t a case of just pushing the deal but, given the fact this is likely going to be an issue for some time, it made total sense for issuers to push ahead.”

With the war in the region intensifying and energy prices spiking, equity markets could be tricky for some time.

ECM deal pipe slowing

The pricing of the four benchmark deals was followed by the closing of the IPO of subsea defence business Gabler Group on 4 March and the launch of the listing of another German business Vincorion, which produces high-tech military drive systems, on 6 March.

While this could foster a spirit of ECM optimism, dealmakers are keen to stress that there is not clear read-across to other sectors.

While businesses in defence – and also energy and utilities, given Europe’s need for electrification and energy independence – might still get issuance away, the crisis in the Middle East combined with a recent sell-off in tech and software will make other new listings far more difficult.

All dealmakers speaking to ECM Pulse this past week predict a slowdown in general equity capital markets activity the longer the war in the Middle East rages on.

“A lot of these mega deals were preannounced and expected,” said the third banker. “You wouldn’t be able to do a deal in names where there is no market expectation of a trade.”

As of this morning, Brent Crude has jumped to USD 103/bbl, up 11% intraday, albeit off a high of USD 119/bbl touched before the G7 evoked tapping strategic reserves. Brent has jumped 45% since the US-Israeli strikes on Iran began.

Sustained regional instability could send crude closer to USD 150/bbl, driving inflation and heralding misery for stocks. In these circumstances, many market observers will be banking on the TACO trade.

Indeed, US President Donald Trump could decide to declare victory at any time in a bid to close this chapter. The Iranian government may be minded to lick its wounds in that scenario. But tit-for-tat bombings of desalination plants and continued disruption in the Strait of Hormuz – to say nothing of the Iranian regime’s fury following the killing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei – do not point to a clean off-ramp.

In the meantime, stock derisking is likely accelerated by quant strategies linked to oil prices, already evident last week amid stock losses on Tuesday 3 March, the day oil prices passed USD 80 a barrel, and not on Monday 2 March, when the stock market reaction was relatively muted.

“There definitely seemed to be a lot of machine-led derisking on Tuesday when oil surpassed USD 80,” agreed the second banker. “We all expected that reaction on Monday and not Tuesday.”

“There is so much to consider around oil prices and the impact this is going to have on rate decision making in the UK, Europe, and US. Machines derisk so much faster than human traders and therefore any moves around this can be wildly exaggerated, so that is a risk in the weeks ahead.”

As of this morning, a majority of rates traders are predicting there will be no US rate cuts until at least July, according to the CME Fedwatch tool – a significant change from a month ago where a clear majority predicted the target rate to be at least 325bp-350bp by the end of the June meeting.

Even then, the odds of a Fed rate cut in July now register at almost exactly 50:50.

In this environment of military escalation, it seems the right call for issuers to have pushed ahead with benchmark blocks last week, especially for strategic and accretive M&A.

It may have been painful for some on the buyside – but given stocks’ grim progress today, with no real sense of how this crisis will end, equity sellers that chose to be proactive to get deals done deserve plaudits.

In European ECM, fortune really does often favour the bold.