CMS

Banking and Finance

Partner, Banking and Finance Department in Poland

Rafal Zakrzewski is a Partner in the Banking and Finance Department at CMS Poland.

Rafal has over two decades of experience in advising on financing transactions, acting for both financial institutions and investors, with a particular focus on the energy, fuel, industrial and real estate sectors. Rafal has extensive project finance experience having acted on some of the first large wind farm financing projects in Poland.

Rafal’s field of expertise includes providing English-law advice on general debt financing, project financing and company and real estate acquisition financing. He has successfully advised both finance-providers and borrowers in international transactions executed under English law in Central and Eastern Europe (including in Poland, Ukraine, Romania, the Czech Republic, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Greece, Albania and Turkey), the Baltic States, Central Asia (Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan and Mongolia) and Africa (Morocco, Egypt and Nigeria).

Rafal is a recognised expert on LMA financing documentation and English commercial contract law. He also acts as an expert on English law in legal proceedings conducted abroad. In the course of his professional practice Rafal has also regularly acted on corporate matters, including equity investments, M&A and joint ventures, and high value commercial agreements governed by English law.

Rafal is admitted to practise as a solicitor in England & Wales and Australia, and is a registered foreign lawyer in Poland. From 2019 he was a partner at Baker McKenzie, having previously headed the English law finance desk at Clifford Chance, Warsaw.  Rafal spent most of 2018 on secondment to EBRD as an Associate Director and Senior Counsel.

Rafal has researched and taught law at Oxford University. He is currently affiliated with Cambridge University, for which he created a unique transaction-based course (the “Deals Course”) on financial and corporate transactions. Rafal is the author of numerous practitioner books and articles on English commercial law, often cited by common law courts. He is a member of the International Committee of the Law Society of England and Wales.

Polish, English

Member, and a committee member on its International Committee - Law Society of England and Wales

Member - Queensland Law Society (non-practising)

Member - Regional Chamber of Legal Advisors in Warsaw

Bachelor of Arts/ Bachelor of Laws (Hons I) (Queensland)

Doctor of Philosophy (Law) (Oxford)

Practice areas: - Banking and Finance - Financial Institutions - Project Finance - Real Estate Finance - Renewable Energy - Equity Investments - M&A and joint ventures - Commercial contracts