Middle East - United Arab Emirates
4

Banking and finance: Corporate finance (including Islamic lending)

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Akin

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Akin is highly active in bespoke fresh funding transactions, including corporate, acquisition, and real estate finance, offering both conventional and Islamic structures. The firm also boasts a strong restructuring and refinancing practice, adept at handling complex, multi-jurisdictional matters, alongside an expansive fund financing offering. Team lead Rizwan Kanji brings extensive expertise across Islamic finance, general finance, and capital markets, with a proven track record in highly structured transactions. Andrew Heller advises on a broad range of financial products across the credit spectrum on UAE and Saudi Arabia mandates, while Nicola Minervini is well-regarded for his debt capital markets knowledge. Sahar Abas handles both conventional and Islamic finance transactions.

Legal 500 Editorial commentary

Testimonials

Collated independently by Legal 500 research team.

  • ‘Akin's team is always responsive and constructively approaches us. In addition to legal advice, we also exchange views about structures, market developments and comparable transactions, which we find very useful. We are most pleased to partner up with Akin on our international Sukuk issuances and other English law financing transactions.’

  • ‘Rızwan Khanji, Nicola Minervini and Sahar Abas are always available for our inquires. They all have a very positive and fair handling of our legal matters and documentation/transactional needs. We will continue to work with Akin and its team going forward who contributed greatly to our Bank's growth. ’

  • ‘Team is amazing. Good at structuring.’

Key clients

  • Emirates NBD Capital
  • GFH Financial Group B.S.C.
  • Kuwait Finance House
  • Raiffeisen Bank International AG
  • Al Baraka Turk Katilim Bnakasi
  • Kuveyt Turk Katilim Bankasi

Work highlights

  • Advised long-standing client Emirates NBD Capital Limited in connection with the senior unsecured, UAE Dirham denominated, AED 4.2 billion term commodity murabaha facility and revolving commodity murabaha facility made available to Salik P.J.S.C. by Emirates NBD Bank.
  • Advising GFH Financial Group B.S.C. in establishing a Shari’ah compliant investment fund which has been uniquely structured to satisfy Shari’ah requirements and ensure U.S. tax efficiency.
  • Advised a syndicate of the globe’s largest lenders, including ING Bank N.V., Deutsche Bank AG, Raiffeisen Bank International AG and Société Générale, in connection with the amendment and restatement of an existing EUR 130 million borrowing base credit facility granted to NLMK Sales Europe SA  and guaranteed by Wallonie Entreprendre SA.

Lawyers

Leading partners
The strongest partners in their field, leading on market-leading deals and endorsed by peers and clients alike.

Practice head

The lawyer(s) leading their teams.

Rizwan Kanji

Other key lawyers

Andrew Heller, Nicola Minervini, Sahar Abas