Bankers miss out on £1billion fees bonanza

ADVISERS will miss out on fees worth up to £1bn after Saudi Arabia abandoned plans to float its stateowned oil group.

Bankers, lawyers, accountants and consultants were hoping for a bumper payday from the listing of Saudi Aramco in a deal that could have valued it at £1.6trillion.

But plans to sell £80bn of Aramco shares to investors have been ditched indefinitely, leaving advisers wondering what might have been.

The chance to work on what would have been the biggest stock market listing of all time sent bankers scrambling for a role in the deal on both sides of the Atlantic.

Stock markets in London, New York and Hong Kong were all vying to be chosen for the listing. Senior bankers swarmed to the company’s headquarters in the desert kingdom, with several waiting hours for meetings with the chairman or chief executive only to be awarded meetings with lower-ranking officials.

A deal of this size could have triggered a fees bonanza of £500m-£1bn.

However, banks were said to be offering to work for far less in a desperate bid to work on such a prestigious project.

JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, HSBC, Moelis & Co and Evercore are understood to have been working on the deal, with law firm White and Case as legal adviser.

Others were hoping to join in when the stock market listing went ahead.

But on Tuesday it emerged the float was off, with bankers working on it disbanded.

Saudi has insisted it remains committed to the listing – ‘at a time of its own choosing’.

It originally hoped to do it this year.