INTERNATIONAL FIRMS LEAGUE TABLES International firms
PROJECT FINANCE Highly recommended
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton Davis Polk & Wardwell Latham & Watkins
Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy Norton Rose
Simpson Thacher & Bartlett
Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom Sullivan & Cromwell
Recommended Baker & McKenzie Bracewell & Giuliani
Cassels Brock & Blackwell
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer Gardere Wynne Sewell Hogan Lovells
McCarthy Tétrault Morrison & Foerster Proskauer Rose Squire Sanders
Notable Paul Hastings Janofsky & Walker
CORPORATE Highly recommended
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton Davis Polk & Wardwell Latham & Watkins
Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy Norton Rose
Simpson Thacher & Bartlett
Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom Sullivan & Cromwell
Recommended Baker & McKenzie Bracewell & Giuliani
Cassels Brock & Blackwell
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer Hogan Lovells
McCarthy Tétrault Morrison & Foerster
Paul Hastings Janofsky & Walker Proskauer Rose Squire Sanders
Notable Gardere Wynne Sewell
Jurisdiction USA USA USA USA
Canada USA USA USA
USA USA
Canada UK
USA USA
Canada USA USA USA
USA
DISPUTES Highly recommended
Bracewell & Giuliani Davis Polk & Wardwell
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer Gardere Wynne Sewell Hogan Lovells
Simpson Thacher & Bartlett
Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom Squire Sanders
Jurisdiction USA USA UK
USA USA USA USA USA
Introduction
It is a heady moment for global law firms that have long chafed under restrictions on where and when they can do deals in Latin America or whether they can have a presence at all. Historic changes are afoot in many of the larger countries in the region, Venezuela in particular. “I think the political situation in Venezuela can only go up,” one partner in the project finance practice at a white-shoe Wall Street firm told IFLR1000. While Venezuela is still sorting out the results of its disputed April 14 election, firms are excited about the possibility of a break from the late Hugo Chavez’s hostility to foreign interest (and investment) in Venezuela’s oil reserves, the largest in the world outside of Saudi Arabia. Elsewhere in the region, other encouraging changes are afoot.
Jurisdiction USA USA USA USA
Canada USA USA USA
USA USA
Canada UK
USA
Canada USA USA USA USA
USA
As Peru stamps out the remnants of its Maoist rebel movement and Colombia edges toward victory over its violent drug dealers, these jurisdictions are increasingly attractive locales for major cross-border transactions. Such deals are too numerous to list here but recent examples include Davis Polk advising Linea Amarilla as issuer and borrower in relation to an $885 million financing for the construction and expansion of the Via Parque Rimac toll road in Lima, and Latham & Watkins providing counsel to Colombia’s national oil and gas firm, Ecopetrol, in the financing and devel- opment of expansions to the Reficar Refinery located in Carta- gena, Colombia. Chinese and Japanese investors’ and development banks’ interest in Latin America is surging, as evidenced by deals like the financing of the expansion of Bogota’s El Dorado Airport, a project on which Milbank advised the China Development Bank and other senior lenders. The global firms are at a unique juncture, poised to take advantage of strong Asian interest coinciding with vastly improved conditions for deals within Latin America. How will the global firms perform in Latin America through
the rest of 2013 and beyond? That depends on many local factors – regulatory reform foremost among them – but it also depends on the public’s knowledge of and appreciation for the expertise and capabilities of attorneys specialising in cross-border deals.
12 ENERGY & INFRASTRUCTURE | LATIN AMERICA 2013
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