Latham & Watkins LLP

Latham & Watkins LLP’s commitment to Latin America, its global leadership in capital markets transactions, and its immense presence in energy and infrastructure, provides a foundation for a flourishing practice. This includes complex deals such as project and infrastructure bonds, bank/bond transactions and securitisations. Having expanded the team with lateral hires in recent years, it has further grown the senior bench with the promotion of Washington DC-based Carlos Ardila and New York’s John Slater to the partnership; both are native Spanish speakers and Slater recently advised on the first Mexico-focused SPAC IPO in Latin America. Mexico City native Roderick Branch, who divides his time between Chicago and New York, has worked on a range of headline deals over the years, including marquee transactions for Corporación Andina de Fomento (CAF); he recently advised CAF on its largest ever bond financing, which closed in January 2023. Guido Liniado and Gianluca Bacchiocchi are leaders in project bonds, bank/bond transactions and sustainability-linked bonds, along with hybrid transactions backed by government receivables, commercial receivables and future flows of payment rights; Bacchiocchi has advised Goldman Sachs on a series of headline transactions in Latin America; and Liniado advised the banks on on the Rumichaca-Pasto toll road project, the largest-ever financing for a Colombian 4G toll road and the largest infrastructure sustainable bond in Latin America. The team also benefits from the firm’s national office, which features a group of former senior figures at the SEC.