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Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP climbs the ranking this year, having continued to reinvest in its finance practices, notably its derivatives and structured products group. The arrival of James Duncan from A&O Shearman in mid-2023 increased the firm’s capacity for strategic equity financing transactions, including margin loans, derivatives, structured share buyback transactions, and more. Lead partner Richard Hart‘s expertise in structured equity transactions, prime brokerage, structured stock-lending and repo transactions, coupled with Flora McLean’s understanding of bespoke transactions with a regulatory capital or tax angle, give the firm a strong offering for its growing roster of corporate, bank, and private equity clients. Matthew Dodwell‘s work on the hedging of a €4.9bn corporate transaction demonstrates the firm’s strength at counsel level. Clients remark that the firm has ’excellent knowledge of the product area, with a strong understanding of market practices‘ and is ’extremely client-focused‘.

Legal 500 Editorial commentary

Testimonials

Collated independently by Legal 500 research team.

  • ‘Excellent knowledge of the product area, with a strong understanding of market practices. The team is also able to find pragmatic ways of resolving issues, and able to explain complex topics in simple terms. Extremely client-focused, with attention to delivering projects to agreed timelines.’

  • ‘James Duncan is phenomenal - technically precise, always willing to give a sensible view about new ideas, commercially astute.’

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Key clients

  • CIEP Neptune S.a.r.l.
  • UBS AG
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Work highlights

  • Advised UBS on the impact of the merger with Credit Suisse on its derivatives and other traded product arrangements.
  • Advising HSBC on a EUR 250 million margin loan to be made available to an Irish ICAV, secured on French listed shares, US treasuries and money market fund interests.
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