City recruitment clearly slowed down last week but Alston & Bird managed to add to its relatively new City branch while Signature Litigation partner Simon Bushell leaves the firm after three years.
Atlanta-based Alston & Bird has hired structured finance partner James Fisher from Reed Smith to its finance practice in London. He has experience advising corporate trust and agency clients on the full gamut of deals, including securitisations and CDOs. He also focuses on post-closing matters such as restructurings, defaults, remediations and exercises of discretion.
Partner and co-head of the firm’s finance group, Shanell Cramer told Legal Business: ‘Our goal in London is to mirror our most successful practices in the US. We have one of the largest corporate trust teams in the US and represent many of the most active corporate trust departments. Adding James in London allows us to expand the services we provide for our existing clients in the UK market as well as expanding services for James’ clients in the US.’
Alston & Bird opened its London office in September last year, hiring Andrew Petersen and James Spencer from K&L Gates and James Ash-Taylor from Constantine Cannon.
Meanwhile, veteran disputes specialist Simon Bushell is leaving Signature Litigation to set up his own boutique, Seladore Legal, with former Herbert Smith Freehills colleague Gareth Keillor.
Bushell joined Signature in 2017 from Latham & Watkins where he was chair of its London litigation department. He was also a partner at Herbert Smith Freehhills for 16 years prior to joining Latham. He specialises civil fraud and asset tracing litigation , investment banking disputes, breaches of trust and fiduciary duty, professional negligence, money laundering and shareholder disputes.
Elsewhere , DAC Beachcroft added insurance partner Ana Catalina Restrepo from Colombian form Tamayo Jaramillo & Asociados to its office in Bogota.
Restrepo focuses on insurance litigation and arbitration, particularly on liability matters, medical malpractice, financial lines and property and is also experienced in claims handling services.
Head of insurance Helen Faulkner, commented: ‘Ana Catalina has an excellent reputation in the insurance and reinsurance markets and will be a real asset for our team in Colombia and the firm as a whole. We are the international law firm of choice for the global insurance industry and having a strong presence in all the key insurance markets in which our clients choose to operate – including those across Latin America – is a key part of our strategy.’
Finally, Willkie Farr & Gallagher also added a structured finance partner in Europe, this time in Paris. Thomas Binet joins from French powerhouse Gide Loyrette Nouel, where he has extensive experience working in the areas of structured finance, debt restructuring and corporate finance. He regularly acts as counsel for lenders, borrowers, sponsors, and senior, mezzanine and unitranche arrangers in their financing activities and restructurings.
‘Strengthening the team [in Paris] is part of our wider strategy of developing a leading European platform to advise our clients in the areas of financing, private equity, special situations and restructuring, which has grown with the recent additions of market-leading finance partners Ashley Young in London and Ralf Defren in Frankfurt,’ added Eduardo Fernandez and Christophe Garaud, co-managing partners of Willkie’s Paris office.
