What are the most significant cases or transactions that your legal team has recently been involved in?

In June 2021, I was invited to develop the legal department of Constellation Investimentos, a traditional asset manager in the Brazilian market. After learning about the company, I implemented the legal department, reviewed the work of external lawyers and made the replacements I deemed necessary. In addition, I absorbed a lot of the work that was previously allocated to the offices, promoting a good reduction of legal costs. In addition to the legal routine as the company’s internal gear, I studied different jurisdictions to verify the regulatory environment and improve the analysis of new investment products.

Regarding the operations of investment funds, I coordinated the contracts and negotiations of alternative investments, such as private equity operations. On the innovation side, my experience with big data in legal services allowed me to bring a jurimetrics project in investment analysis. Furthermore, we improved corporate governance practices and carried out fully in-house corporate reorganisations, as well as position our legal department in the market, interacting with peers and capital market associations. Lastly, given the doubts of Brazilian investors and jurists about SPACs, I published a legal article in a scientific journal about the implementation of the North American SPAC in the Brazilian legal system. As an effect, after one year of hard and quality work, I was invited by Constellation’s management to join the partnership.

In general, what would you like to see change about the external law firms you use? Examples could be greater flexibility in billing, a more expansive suite of services offered, more transparency in reporting ESG statistics etc.

Considering the specifics of an asset manager regulated in multiple jurisdictions, my main expectations regarding external lawyers are, for instance, personalised attention, adherence to the client’s strategic decisions, collaboration in cost forecasting and constant follow up. Taylor-made attention is necessary because one size fits all in legal advice does not work for a reputable asset manager. Still, I often see old standard solutions being brought to the table when dealing with external counsel.

Additionally, adherence to the client’s strategic decisions is another relevant topic. Occasionally, external lawyers do not understand the client’s decisions because they only focus on a technical point of view. Lawyers with a holistic view are able to bring more distinctive and accurate solutions, even more so if they are knowledgeable of the resource management business. Expected costs are also a controversial topic with external counsel. It is common for the company to have tight budgets and this impacts the space for new costs, which is very worrying for any in-house legal department.

Finally, careful monitoring of projects is essential. There are external lawyers who do not inform us quickly about the progress of matters. This gives a bad impression about the real importance of the client to the law firm and can influence the decision on future projects.