Howard Kennedy LLP

Business Crime & Regulatory

David Hamilton is a partner at Howard Kennedy. He is a white-collar and regulatory lawyer with significant experience advising on bribery, fraud, money laundering, and market manipulation matters. He has a particular specialism in financial services enforcement and compliance.

David has nearly 15 years' experience representing individuals and corporates in the context of internal investigations and actions brought by domestic and international regulatory and law enforcement bodies including the FCA, SFO, HMRC, the police, the European Commission, and US Department of Justice. Notably, he has acted on the FCA's high-profile investigations into LIBOR and FX manipulation, representing individuals suspected of market misconduct and senior managers investigated for governance and oversight failings.

David has advised in the context of regulatory enforcement actions involving insider dealing in debt and equity markets, anti-competitive behaviour in relation to IPOs and share placings, and consumer redress schemes following the mis-selling of financial products to over two million customers. He has also acted for individuals and companies investigated by HMRC for tax offences, in particular securing the discontinuance of a four-year multinational VAT fraud investigation into an ultra-high-net-worth individual.

Alongside his investigations practice, David has significant experience advising clients on financial crime and regulatory compliance systems and controls. He has worked across a broad range of sectors, including financial services, real estate, energy, infrastructure and retail to implement appropriate risk-based preventive procedures. These include risk assessments, third party due diligence and screening, governance and oversight frameworks. David has particular expertise in the application of the Money Laundering Regulations, having advised a substantial number of clients on their compliance programmes, registration and ongoing engagement with supervisory authorities.

David also supports clients with remediation exercises where breaches are identified, advising on regulatory reporting obligations and internal and external stakeholder management.

David is a former officer of the International Bar Association's Anti-Corruption Committee.