Marks & Spencer may be inexplicably back in vogue, but the times when deal-starved lawyers got excited about a bidding war for a dull high street icon are well and truly in the past.
Yes, 2005 can officially be classed as the year when major public deals finally returned after three years in which private equity ruled the roost. True, volume is hardly up on 2004, but the statistics confirm the value of deals is up annually more than 50% in the first 11 months of 2005, as big-ticket work returns.
