Hogan Lovells Cadwalader looks to tap transatlantic dealmaking boom following merger
Global law firm Hogan Lovells Cadwalader is looking to grab more of the private capital market from rivals and tap into a boom in transatlantic dealmaking following the City firm’s merger with the oldest legal practice on Wall Street.
UK managing partner Penny Angell told City PM the merger creates “a stronger bench” for the combined companies to target the buoyant private capital market and take a bigger slice of one of the industry’s highest-billing sectors.
The tie-up between the two firms, which completed on 1 July, marks the largest transatlantic legal merger in history, creating a combined law firm with revenue of $3.6bn and a headcount of over 3,200.
Hogan Lovells Cadwalader’s corporate and finance arm has been its main revenue driver, and the company is now looking to tap into the wave of US private equity companies buying UK firms, Angell said.
“The UK is an attractive investment opportunity for the US, and we’ve seen some fantastic transactions,” Angell told City PM. “But I think there could be even more.”
The firm has been actively beefing up its private equity footprint after poaching two top partners, Michael James and Edward Meadowcroft, from rival firm Paul Hastings in September to build out the practice. Hogan Lovells Cadwalader said this was “deliberate investment we are making in our global private equity platform and broader private capital offering”.
“Success is not about pure size, it’s about strengthening the New York-London corridor,” Angell said, adding that chief executive Miguel Zaldivar “has made no secret” of seeing this as a lucrative opportunity to leverage the firm’s presence in the US and UK.
“Making the most of and strengthening those financial institutions and private capital opportunities is important,” she said.
UK is ‘an attractive investment opportunity for the US’
London has been hit by a wave of US-led takeovers in the past month.
Easyjet on Friday agreed the terms of a takeover by US private equity behemoth Apollo after initially agreeing a deal with another US suitor, Castlelake; Ramsdens agreed to a takeover by American rival Firstcash and FTSE 100 Segro has rejected a £12.6bn approach from Californian real estate investor Prologis.
The value of agreed takeovers of London-listed firms this year now sits at $34.8bn, according to data from LSEG, nearly double that of the take-privates across the entirety of last year.
“In London last year, our largest sector by billings was financial institutions, followed by private capital,” Angell said.
“Finance is at the heart of so many different transactions and financial institutions are so phenomenally important to the global economy,” she added.