The strategic hiring of five partners for the firm’s global finance practice expands its US presence and enhances its ability to serve US and international clients.
Allen & Overy has hired five leveraged finance partners based in New York for its global finance practice.
The five new hires from other top firms are: senior leveraged finance partner Scott M. Zemser, dual qualified partner Alan Rockwell and partners Rajani Gupta, Judah Frogel and Todd Koretzky.
Zemser, Rockwell and Frogel are joining A&O from White & Case while Gupta and Koretzky are from Proskauer Rose and Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy, respectively.
Zemser will be leading the five-partner leveraged finance team. A&O now has more than 250 finance partners across the U.S., EMEA and Asia Pacific.
“The US and European leveraged finance markets have changed significantly over the past few years. They are no longer completely independent markets with separate pools of liquidity, but are increasingly used to finance both domestic transactions and deals outside of their home market,” Philip Bowden, A&O’s global co-head of Banking, said.
“The addition of this highly experienced team of U.S. lawyers, led by Scott Zemser who has over 25 years of US and international leveraged finance experience, greatly enhances our ability to support clients globally regardless of the type of law or place of origin of their financing transactions,” he added.
A&O’s senior partner Wim Dejonghe said that the addition of the team means that “very few” top-tier US or global firms have the ability to field a combined US and European leveraged finance practice like A&O now.
Zemser, who is now A&O partner and co-head of global leveraged finance, said that the team will expand the firm’s US finance practice and straighten the firm’s position in the European and Asian leveraged finance market.
“We have joined Allen & Overy because it’s one of the global elite law firms and provides our team with an incredible global platform to serve our clients in multiple practice areas,” he said.
A&O’s U.S. domestic and international finance practice represents financial institutions as lead arrangers, underwriters and participants across all types of financings and also advises clients on complex debt restructurings and workouts.
Its key existing institutional clients include Bank of America, BNP Paribas, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan.
