The Highest-Grossing Global IPOs of All Time

Iconic American automaker General Motors (GM) made its historic return to the stock market Thursday with what's shaping up to be the largest initial public offering in history.

The carmaker sold about 478 million shares for $33 a share, raising at least $18 billion. Throw in the value of preferred shares and other options, and the IPO is likely to reap a global record of at least $22.7 billion. GM returned return to the New York Stock Exchange (NYX) under its old ticker, GM. Shares popped 9% soon after the opening bell.

Not only would the GM IPO eclipse the previous U.S. record held by Visa (V), which raised $19.65 billion in March 2008, according to data from Thomson Reuters, it would become the biggest on the planet (not adjusted for inflation). The previous record of $22.1 billion was raised by Agriculture Bank of China just four months ago (see table below).