The Bank of England has hired Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer corporate partner Graham Nicholson to lead its legal team. Nicholson will take over from Dame Juliet Wheldon as chief legal adviser and adviser to the governor of the Bank of England at the start of next year. Wheldon was head of the government legal service before […]
Shoosmiths to launch in Manchester” />Shoosmiths is set open its first office in Manchester within the next three months, which will focus on mortgage recovery work. Lender services head Waine Mannix (pictured) will spearhead the Manchester launch, having recruited lawyers from DLA Piper and mortgage finance company HL Interactive for the new office. Mannix said: […]
Three US firms have set up individual crisis groups to help their clients get to grips with the ongoing turbulence in the financial markets. Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld has named its group the Financial Markets Crisis Resource Center while K&L Gates has set up a global financial markets group and Mayer Brown has […]
Herbert Smith’s Benelux ally Stibbe has landed a role on the bailout of another Belgian bank, acting for the authorities on the nationalisation of Dexia. As revealed by TheLawyer.com yesterday (29 September), Stibbe corporate partners Marc Fyon and Olivier Clevenbergh and finance partner Ivan Peeters are advising the Belgian government, as well as the country’s […]
Facebook has hired Kirkland & Elllis partner Theodore Ullyot as its new general counsel. Ullyot was the former chief of staff to Alberto Gonzales, who was the US attorney general until his resignation last year following accusations of perjury. Ullyot will be based in Facebook’s California headquarters, moving from Kirkland’s Washington office. He took the […]
The announcement that Wragge & Co is to make 30 fee-earners redundant should hardly come as a surprise. Corporate and real estate – the two sectors that have been most affected by the downturn across the legal market – were together responsible for almost half the firm’s revenue last year. What is surprising is how […]
Davis Polk & Wardwell, Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom and Sullivan & Cromwell have scored lead roles on Citigroup’s acquisition of Wachovia’s banking operations. Partners John Ettinger and Phillip Mills are leading a Davis Polk team advising Citi, while Sullivan & Cromwell chairman Rodgin Cohen is leading a team advising Wachovia on its $10m […]
SJ Berwin has boosted its German property practice with the hire of partner Hans Thomas Kessler, director of real estate at Beiten Burkhardt. Kessler is understood to be bringing a team of associates, although SJ Berwin is still in negotiations as to how many. Senior partner Jonathan Blake said the appointment was “good news” for […]
Debating whether public or private legal work is superior is a redundant exercise. Geoff Wild dispels some in-house myths “It’s not like that in the private sector.” It is a phrase often made by private practitioners when asked to comment on the world of the local government lawyer. No, it is not. And nor should […]
As The Lawyer revealed last week (22 September), the UK’s largest unitary authority Birmingham City Council is reviewing its legal panel of 21 firms. Director of governance Mirza Ahmad will next month invite existing panel firms to apply for contracts that are set to begin in September 2009 and which taken together account for an […]
Ashurst, Herbert Smith and Slaughter and May have been handed leading roles in the rescue package for Bradford & Bingley. After a weekend of emergency negotiations, it was agreed that Spanish bank Santander will take over B&B’s savings business and branches while the £50bn lending business will be nationalised. Herbert Smith corporate head Michael Walter […]
Clifford Chance private equity partner Matthew Layton is running unopposed for the role of global corporate head at the firm, with nominations set to close this week. Layton became a Clifford Chance partner in 1991 and was London corporate head from 1999 to 2003. He has been tipped as the frontrunner for the job since […]