On the surface, it has been business as usual in the booming private equity industry this week. Clayton Dubilier & Rice agreed to take over ServiceMaster, a US lawncare specialist, for $4.5bn (£2.3bn, €3.4bn). Others including Blackstone and Carlyle were plotting a $45bn-plus counter-bid for TXU, a Texas utility coveted by a rival consortium – threatening again to break the record for the largest buy-out in history.

In Europe, meanwhile, private equity executives were trying to defuse the political and social controversies caused by their quest to own ever larger chunks of global business.