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Online brokerage eToro (ETTO.PVT) was among the firms that paused IPO plans in the days following President Trump’s "Liberation Day" tariff announcement, but on Monday, those plans came back off the shelf as the trading site filed plans to go public.
It was one of several announcements this week that buoyed hopes that IPO and M&A dealmaking could be thawing in May after a wrenching month of uncertainty in April.
Food delivery app DoorDash (DASH) on Tuesday announced two acquisitions worth approximately $5 billion: UK food delivery app Deliveroo for $3.9 billion and New York food tech company SevenRooms for about $1.2 billion.
That followed $30 billion worth of deals announced on Monday, including a $9.1 billion agreement for US gas station operator Sunoco (SUN) to buy Canadian gas company Parkland Corporation (PKI.TO). Footwear maker Skechers (SKX) also unveiled plans to be taken private by 3G Capital for roughly $9.4 billion.
“We are cautiously optimistic we’ll see a pickup in deal activity given market volatility continues to ease,” said Ivan Farman, co-head of Global M&A at Bank of America.
"Probably more optimistic for the second half of the year,” he added. Farman cited clarity around potential tax changes and deregulatory initiatives from the current administration as "tailwinds" for deals later this year.
What helps in the meantime is that stocks have snapped back after April's "Liberation Day" rout and strong first quarter earnings reports from Meta (META), Alphabet (GOOGL), and Microsoft (MSFT) in the past two weeks have also eased some investor fears.
There is also increasing talk in Washington, D.C., about trade deals with many of America’s trading partners, which would give companies more certainty about their future plans.
Apollo Global Management (APO) CEO Marc Rowan told Yahoo Finance this week that his firm sees “uncertainty” among the companies that comprise Apollo’s vast portfolio. (Disclosure: Yahoo Finance is owned by Apollo Global Management.)
“When you don't know what the rules of the game are, you stop investing, you stop hiring, you stop making moves."
Certainly, any widespread dealmaking revival still has a ways to go. The volume of announced US mergers and acquisitions as measured in dollar value fell 5% for the year through May 6 when compared with the same period last year, according to Dealogic data.
And the number of deals being made by US companies so far this year — 3,047 — is at the lowest pace since 2009.
What’s more, more than half of the companies that planned to go public this summer have pushed back their plans to the fall, according to Matthew Kennedy, a senior strategist for Renaissance Capital.