Charles Kerrigan

CMS

Before getting into cryptocurrencies as a lawyer, Charles Kerrigan dabbled in them as an investor. Not much money came out of his personal trading but, professionally, this new area has become one of CMS’s fastest-growing practices.

Four years ago, fintech specialist Kerrigan, who serves banks and Silicon Valley companies, launched one of the few crypto practices in the City. He immersed himself in the growing tech communities springing up globally. Start-ups relating to smart contracts and bitcoin grew bigger and Kerrigan provided them with corporate advice on their expansion.

As opposed to a traditional clientele, these start-ups are often led by young computer scientists, meaning lawyers need to speak their language. To this end, Kerrigan built a team by hiring specialist in-house lawyers as well as the CEO of a crypto networking hub.

He thought it would be a side business of the practice, but the offering has taken off alongside the value of the market – now worth $3trn. The team consists of 10 specialists serving more than 100 clients, including hedge funds and blockchain investment funds, merchant bank Greengage, digital asset custodian copper.co, and Binance, the largest crypto exchange.

And this year? Kerrigan will seek to capture mandates around the much-hyped metaverse.