Practice of law: best examples in legal work

Read the other FT Innovative Lawyers Europe ‘Best practice case studies’, which showcase the standout innovations made for and by people working in the legal sector:

Business of law
In-house

Standout

Weil, Gotshal & Manges and White & Case: Joint winners
Originality: 8; Leadership: 7; Impact: 9; Total: 24
The firms advised on restructuring Zambia’s $13bn debt after the country defaulted on its foreign borrowings in 2020. Under the terms of the deal struck in principle last year, lenders led by China agreed to rearrange $6.3bn in loans, with a three-year grace period on interest payments, as well as extended maturities.

Unusually, the agreement offers less debt relief if Zambia’s economy fares better than expected through the creation of “step-up” bonds.

Weil, Gotshal & Manges acted on behalf of the group’s western private investors, while White & Case represented the Zambian government.

Highly commended

William Fry
O: 7; L: 7; I: 9; Total: 23
Last year, the firm acted for bondholders in the winding up of two Russian aircraft leasing companies based in Ireland, worth an estimated €4.1bn. The Irish high court rejected attempts by owners of the sanctions-hit GTLK Europe DAC and GTLK Europe Capital DAC to continue operation, allowing their liquidations.

Cuatrecasas and Gómez-Acebo & Pombo
O: 7; L: 7; I: 8; Total: 22
The firms used revised Spanish insolvency law — designed to ease lenders’ ability to restructure distressed companies — to help Spanish steelmaker Celsa’s senior creditors conclude a restructuring of the business without shareholder approval. The Commercial Court of Barcelona approved the restructuring in September 2023.

Commended

Brown Rudnick
O: 6; L: 7; I: 6; Total: 19
In a deal struck with lenders last November, the firm acted for London-based property investor Queensgate Investments in the debt refinancing of its international hostel chain Generator Hostels for nearly €750mn. The business offers low-cost travel accommodation at 21 sites across Europe and the US.

PLMJ
O: 7; L: 6; I: 6; Total: 19
The firm advised on the rescuing and restructuring of Adelino Duarte da Mota, a Portuguese supplier of raw ceramic materials.

After years of infighting between former investors, PLMJ negotiated a rescue plan backed by creditors but opposed by previous shareholders in court appeals last year. The disputed debt-for-equity scheme, eased by recent changes in EU-compliant laws, won final court approval in February.

Watson Farley & Williams
O: 6; L: 7; I: 6; Total: 19
Last year, the firm expanded its Global Aviation Restructuring Index, an online service that compares restructuring procedures across the sector worldwide. The Gari service, first launched in 2021 during the crisis in the sector after Covid shutdowns, remains free to use.

Standout

Mishcon de Reya: Winner
Originality: 8; Leadership: 8; Impact: 9; Total: 25
The firm successfully acted for Nigeria in its appeal against an arbitration award from 2017 that had grown in value to $11bn by last year. It had been granted to a little-known energy contractor called Process and Industrial Developments, based offshore in the British Virgin Islands. But, last October, an English High Court judge found the arbitral awards “were obtained by fraud and the awards were, and the way in which they were procured was, contrary to public policy”. The judge also found one of the company’s founders had given “perjured evidence to the tribunal”.

An original arbitration ruling in London had ordered Nigeria to pay $6.6bn following the collapse of work on a fraudulent contract, initially signed in 2010 between P&ID and the country’s petroleum ministry.

Hogan Lovells
O: 7; L: 8; I: 9; Total: 24
In a landmark legal victory last November, the firm successfully defended the London Metal Exchange against traders who sued it over a decision to cancel billions of dollars’ worth of nickel trades. England’s High Court dismissed claims that the LME acted unlawfully when it cancelled $12bn worth of nickel trades amid market chaos in March 2022. Judges upheld the exchange’s right to “cancel, vary or correct” trades if the venue “considers it appropriate”.

Vieira de Almeida
O: 7; L: 8; I: 8; Total: 23
In March 2023, Portugal’s supreme administrative court backed a scheme, designed by the firm on behalf of the Bank of Portugal, to handle the 2014 collapse of Banco Espírito Santo, once the country’s largest listed bank. The controversial rescue had faced years of challenge through hundreds of cases brought against the banking regulator by shareholders and junior debt holders whose investments were to be wiped out under the plan. But the firm persuaded the courts to pursue two pilot cases, which broadly upheld the central bank’s actions, last year.

Highly commended

Garrigues
O: 7; L: 7; I: 8; Total: 22
The firm represented an association of craft cider makers in Spain’s Asturias province in preventing rivals using its traditional, distinctive “iron mould” bottle shape. The country’s supreme court overturned a lower court’s ruling in July last year, and reestablished the producers’ right to limit use of the design under trademark protection.

Travers Smith
O: 8; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 22
The firm helped Dutch truckmaker DAF secure a high-profile win in the UK’s Supreme Court in 2023. In a blow to the litigation funding industry, the court ruled that an agreement to finance a case brought by the Road Haulage Association at the UK’s Competition Appeal Tribunal, alleging anti-competitive practices by DAF and other truckmakers, was unenforceable.

Ellex
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
The firm represented Lithuanian DIY retail chain Kesko Senukai at the European Court of Human Rights last year. In 2018, Lithuania’s domestic courts had refused to examine the chain’s complaints of abusive and illegal evidence collection in raids by state competition investigators. The ECHR found in favour of the company, granting damages.

Morgan Lewis
O: 7; L: 8; I: 6; Total: 21
The firm represented Advanz Pharma and its previous owners in an appeal against a £100mn fine imposed by the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority in 2021. The watchdog has claimed Advanz abused its market dominance by increasing the price of a thyroid drug by more than 1,000 per cent over eight years. The UK’s Competition Appeal Tribunal backed the CMA in 2023, but overturned its decision in March after the defence demonstrated a failure in due process in trial cross-examination. The case remains subject to review.

Commended

Aequo
O: 7; L: 7; I: 6; Total: 20
In 2023, the firm acted for GTSOU, Ukraine’s gas network operator, in an appeal to the country’s supreme court to tighten the enforcement of debt payments by regional gas networks to the company. However, settlement on the arrears remains stalled because of the country’s continuing conflict with Russia.

Uría Menéndez
O: 7; L: 6; I: 6; Total: 19
The firm defended Italian broadcaster Mediaset against the UK’s ITV in a claim for additional damages for breach of copyright over a game show format. The first lawsuit had been settled by an award of €8.7mn in 2019 and the lawyers persuaded Spain’s supreme court that this amount covered claims made in the second lawsuit.

Standout

Linklaters: Winner
Originality: 10; Leadership: 10; Impact: 5; Total: 25
The firm worked pro bono to assist Scope 3 Climate Capital, a UK community interest company, in encouraging the funding of environmental improvements. Its Sector Transition Acceleration Contract framework is designed to help carbon-polluting companies, such as steel- and concrete-makers, invest in the decarbonisation efforts of their suppliers, to reduce the emissions that occur across the total supply chain. The firm devised various methods to encourage adoption of the programme, such as involving a third party to monitor processes and compliance.

Highly commended

CMS
O: 9; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 23
The firm’s energy and climate change team helped negotiate the commercial terms for extending a development at Dogger Bank, already planned as the world’s largest offshore wind farm.

Lawyers built on deals that had been reached with the UK’s Crown Estate for existing phases of the project now under construction. The extension, Dogger Bank D, could add up to 2 gigawatts of capacity to the 3.6GW already anticipated from other stages of the North Sea project. It is a 50-50 joint venture between subsidiaries of UK power supplier SSE and Equinor, the Norwegian state-controlled oil and gas group.

Everlegal
O: 7; L: 9; I: 7; Total: 23
The Ukrainian firm established a humanitarian law practice group to work with international aid organisations that have been operating in the country since Russia’s 2022 invasion. Last year, it worked with US agency USAID on an advice service to help local citizens and businesses cope with martial law and other new regulations. It also extended work with the Danish Refugee Council to provide online legal support for Ukrainians worldwide.

Kennedys
O: 9; L: 8; I: 5; Total: 22
The firm’s pro bono team, working with environment-focused legal charity The Chancery Lane Project (TCLP), developed two template clauses that could allow insurers to offer commercial clients explicit liability cover for climate-related injury or property damage claims. The template clauses add to a suite of 120 or so others promoted by TCLP to encourage best practice among businesses in reducing emissions.

Ropes & Gray and Willkie Farr & Gallagher
O: 6; L: 9; I: 7; Total: 22
Starting in 2021, the firms entered a partnership with the in-house legal team of financial news provider Bloomberg to give pro bono legal support to start-ups at Imperial College, London, that are committed to addressing climate change. In 2023, the project — called the Green Tech Legal Collaborative — expanded to include other City of London law firms and advised 18 start-ups. The commercial value of the pro bono legal support is estimated at more than £1mn.

Commended

Burges Salmon
O: 7; L: 6; I: 6; Total: 19
The firm helped Oxygen Conservation — the charitable arm of impact investment group Oxygen House — secure a loan of £20mn from sustainability-focused bank Triodos to buy land for natural restoration and for raising income through eco-tourism, carbon credits and renewable energy generation. The lawyers investigated complex historical title deeds and access rights to the land in Scotland, which collectively spans 23,000 acres.

Cuatrecasas
O: 8; L: 5; I: 6; Total: 19
In 2023, the firm advised Swiss investment group SUSI Partners on easing access to funding for solar power projects. Lawyers advised on the draft of a master agreement that allows the group to take on the so-called future credit rights over power sold from installations, which provides upfront capital for the company to invest in the solar equipment it installs for customers.

Morais Leitão
O: 7; L: 6; I: 6; Total: 19
In 2023, the firm helped EDP Renováveis, a Spain-based renewable energy group majority-owned by Portugal’s main power supplier EDP, to implement scrip dividends, which give shareholders the option to receive additional shares. The project involved working with securities regulators in both countries.

Standout

Ropes & Gray: Winner
Originality: 8; Leadership: 8; Impact: 8; Total: 24
In 2023, the firm launched a tool for asset managers to assess regulatory issues and obligations. A progress report tracks portfolios across their investment cycles, based on the client’s approach to risk.

The service monitors a wide range of risk and compliance challenges, including conformity with anti-bribery, anti-corruption and anti-money laundering measures, as well as sanctions, export controls, ESG, data privacy, and antitrust obligations.

Highly commended

Dechert
O: 7; L: 8; I: 8; Total: 23
Last year, the firm advised the Swedish state pension fund AP7 on a $835mn investment with private equity firm HarbourVest. It went into an open-ended fund aimed at long-term investment in private companies and raising new capital. The fund allows easier incremental investments and withdrawals by clients compared with more typical and illiquid private equity vehicles.

Covington & Burling
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
The firm helped advise US market research group Nielsen IQ on its takeover of German rival GfK, which was completed last year following divestments to overcome EU competition concerns. It helped streamline required changes in GfK’s local incorporation to simplify combining the two businesses.

William Fry
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
The firm advised online payments processor Elavon, a subsidiary of Bancorp US, on switching the location of its European holding company from the Netherlands to Ireland. In a first for Ireland, the country’s high court allowed the conversion of a Dutch business into an Irish company without the need to incorporate a new entity.

Commended

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Latham & Watkins
O: 6; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 20
The firms advised private equity giants Permira and Blackstone on their proposed consortium buyout of eBay-backed online classifieds company Adevinta, valued at €14bn, including debt. Freshfields acted as lead corporate counsel for the investor group, and Latham & Watkins advised on raising €4.5bn in loans to support the deal.

Weil, Gotshal & Manges
O: 7; L: 6; I: 6; Total: 19
The firm advised French private equity firm Ardian and Italy’s Biofarma Group on financing the acquisition of US Pharma Lab, a food supplements maker. To conclude the deal last July required issuing more than €210mn of debt.

Standout

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer: Winner
Originality: 8; Leadership: 9; Impact: 9; Total: 26
The firm acted for Ecpat UK, the children’s rights campaigner, challenging failures in the safeguarding of unaccompanied child asylum seekers in hotels, after Kent County Council stopped accepting the children into its care.

The charity successfully took action in a judicial review in 2023. This led the court to continue monitoring compliance with its ruling that unaccompanied child asylum seekers must stay in the care of local authorities — an unusual measure for a court to take.

Uría Menéndez
O: 8; L: 8; I: 9; Total: 25
A team of nearly 20 lawyers secured authorisation for an Afghan family of nine, members of which had worked with the Spanish authorities and armed forces in Afghanistan, to travel to Spain to seek asylum in early 2024. The group had fled the country after the 2021 withdrawal of western forces but were then denied travel visas to Spain at the country’s embassy in Pakistan.

The firm appealed to Spain’s supreme court, establishing the rights of those fleeing persecution to be granted travel visas by Spanish ambassadors, as well as the right to appeal if visas are denied. Previously, granting travel visas to claim asylum was discretionary.

DLA Piper
O: 9; L: 9; I: 6; Total: 24
The firm has been representing Tonga before the International Court of Justice, which will issue an advisory opinion on small island states’ obligations concerning climate change later this year. The lawyers advised Tonga on written comments it put forward as part of the proceedings, drawing on similar work done by the firm for East Timor and the Solomon Islands in related cases. This work is part of the firm’s broader pro bono focus on helping climate vulnerable nations to access international justice.

Highly commended

Baker McKenzie
O: 7; L: 8; I: 8; Total: 23
The firm supported the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in its successful challenge to the lawfulness of UK government plans to remove asylum seekers to Rwanda. In November last year, the UK Supreme Court upheld the ruling that the Rwanda asylum policy was unlawful, noting the strength of UNHCR’s evidence.

Dechert
O: 7; L: 8; I: 8; Total: 23
The firm helped the Beirut Bar Association sue London-registered chemical trading business Savoro over the blast in Beirut in 2020, when hundreds of tonnes of ammonium nitrate exploded — killing around 220 people and wounding more than 6,000. The lawyers helped establish liability under Lebanese law before the UK High Court, which awarded one living victim and two families of deceased victims around £850,000 in compensation.

Linklaters
O: 8; L: 9; I: 6; Total: 23
Lawyers used an in-house generative AI chatbot to prepare summaries of 50 human trafficking-related prosecutions from around the world, to support campaign group Lawyers Without Borders’ work on human trafficking cases in Tanzania and Zanzibar. The tool made it easier for some lawyers to volunteer short bursts of pro bono time. Commended individual: Lizzie Harker-Noor

Norton Rose Fulbright
O: 8; L: 8; I: 6; Total: 22
The firm provided more than 1,500 hours of support for campaign group Save the Children UK in its participation in the UK government’s Covid public inquiry. Its lawyers used e-discovery to help analyse 55,000 documents and identify where policy decisions may have overlooked the effect on children — such as the closure of playgrounds, schools and childcare centres. The analysis informed nine recommendations Save the Children made to the inquiry.

Commended

Pinsent Masons
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
Partner Annabelle Richard, based in France, advised French child protection organisation e-Enfance on data protection and privacy standards relating to the launch of its mobile app, which she helped to launch in 2022. The service enables children and guardians to report online harassment and online bullying.

Hogan Lovells
O: 6; L: 8; I: 6; Total: 20
Ahead of the UK’s general election, the firm supported campaigns to encourage voting. These included advice for youth registration campaign Give an X and a “voter handbook” covering revisions in voting and voter ID requirements in collaboration with The Politics Project.

Addleshaw Goddard
O: 5; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 19
The firm began pro bono representation of current and ex-servicemen and women before the UK’s War Pensions and Armed Forces Compensation Tribunal in March last year. By February this year, lawyers had handled more than 100 appeals over pension or injury claims, securing as much as £1.3mn for one individual.

Dentons, DLA Piper, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Hogan Lovells, Latham & Watkins
O: 5; L: 6; I: 8; Total: 19
The firms collaborated last year with Kind, a migrant children’s charity, and the Italian Council for Refugees to provide free legal help to more than 500 unaccompanied migrant children and young adults, as well as training for guardians.

White & Case
O: 5; L: 8; I: 6; Total: 19
The firm advised non-profit Bridges Outcomes Partnerships on the launch of a $10.1mn development impact bond to fund sexual and reproductive health services for female teenagers in Kenya.

Standout

Bird & Bird: Winner
Originality: 9; Leadership: 9; Impact: 8; Total: 26
In March 2024, the firm acted for the Crypto Open Patent Alliance, a cryptocurrency industry group, in a copyright dispute with Australian computer scientist Craig Wright, who claimed to be Satoshi Nakamoto, Bitcoin’s incognito creator. The lawyers elicited a threat from Wright against Copa to initiate proceedings against him and used forensic document analysis and crowdsourced evidence to disprove his claim. Wright had previously sued 26 entities in the crypto community over alleged intellectual property rights infringement, so tackling his claim was critical to the industry, which relies on being able to use open-source code.

Linklaters
O: 7; L: 9; I: 9; Total: 25
The firm played a leading role in advising financial services clients and UK government bodies on proposed legislation regarding digital assets and blockchain technology. In 2023, the firm helped clearing house Euroclear establish a platform to issue and clear digital assets and advised the European Investment Bank, the EU’s lending arm, on issuing a digital bond focused on climate issues. It also advised a UK task force on publishing guidelines for crypto assets, smart contracts, and digital securities, to help guide the regulatory status of digital assets in the UK. Commended individual: Richard Hay

Highly commended

CMS
O: 8; L: 7; I: 8; Total: 23
The firm acted for ING and other lenders to arrange financing for the expansion of data centre operator AtlasEdge across Europe, conducting due diligence across 14 jurisdictions. The €525mn debt financing and €200mn revolving credit facility will fund AtlasEdge’s growth in the region.

Uría Menéndez
O: 7; L: 8; I: 7; Total: 22
In 2023, the firm created a “digital and intangibles” group in response to demand for more co-ordinated delivery of multidisciplinary legal advice on digital and IT topics. The team comprises about 50 lawyers drawn from its compliance, litigation and other practices to cover areas including intellectual property, corporate affairs, privacy and cyber security. It acts for Meta, Microsoft, and Santander in Spain.

Commended

Addleshaw Goddard
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
The firm structured a £5mn partnership between Etc, the digital incubation arm of UK telecoms group BT, and Altitude Angel, an air traffic tech provider, to support the development of Project Skyway. This is a proposed air corridor for autonomous drones across south-east England. The firm created the master framework covering Altitude Angel’s installation of drone sensors at BT sites to help co-ordinate future airspace use.

Shoosmiths
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
The firm developed a template questionnaire to identify how the UK’s 2023 Online Safety Act, designed to protect children and adults on the internet, could affect its clients. The questionnaire uses non-legal terms to help it identify and target advice to ensure compliance with legislation. Shoosmiths’ system helped assess which of the online activities and services of the mental health charity Mind risked non-compliance with the new law and needed reviewing.

Aurum Law Firm
O: 7; L: 7; I: 6; Total: 20
The Ukrainian firm developed a practice area to advise so-called “decentralised autonomous organisations”, typically involved in creating cryptocurrencies and assets, on their own legal and governance frameworks. Its DAOwrap platform aims to design legal structures for such organisations.

Portolano Cavallo
O: 6; L: 6; I: 7; Total: 19
Lawyers at the Italian law firm, working alongside Linklaters Italia, helped create a template for investing in start-ups in Italy. The guide is based on a model agreement devised by Silicon Valley start-up incubator Y Combinator but adapted to Italian law. It is designed to enable founders and investors to reach agreements on future share allocations.

Standout

Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer: Winner
Originality: 8; Leadership: 8; Impact: 8; Total: 24
In March last year, the firm advised Swiss bank UBS in the emergency takeover of distressed rival Credit Suisse. An international cross-practice team, led by partners Jennifer Bethlehem and Michael Raffan, helped conclude negotiations over the $3.35bn rescue deal in less than a week.

The team deployed bespoke due diligence systems to help its client rapidly sign off on the transaction, brokered by Swiss regulators to prevent the collapse of Credit Suisse.

Highly commended

Mayer Brown
O: 8; L: 8; I: 7; Total: 23
The firm helped UK green jet-fuel developer Velocys complete its takeover by a consortium of private investors despite one of its Russian shareholders being sanctioned by a UK asset freeze.

Mayer Brown won court approval in January for a remedy that allowed the deal to conclude while preventing proceeds from being received by David Davidovich, an associate of Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, until legally permissible.

Loyens & Loeff
O: 8; L: 6; I: 8; Total: 22
The firm advised Brazilian digital payment operator StoneCo on arranging a near $470mn loan facility to support small, cash-starved businesses in the country. Funding secured from the International Development Finance Corporation, the US agency, allows StoneCo to make faster payment on sales to a range of women-led ventures and other enterprises in poorer northern areas of Brazil.

Sullivan & Cromwell
O: 7; L: 8; I: 7; Total: 22
The firm acted for Schaeffler on its planned takeover of fellow Germany-based car part maker Vitesco Technologies, which is expected to be completed by the end of the year. Lawyers helped advise on financing a tender offer to buy out all outstanding shares of the target last October, which valued Vitesco at €3.6bn.

A&O Shearman
O: 6; L: 8; I: 7; Total: 21
Lawyers advised French bank Société Générale on the launch of its partnership with global asset manager AllianceBernstein in April, to create an equities research joint venture, called Bernstein. SocGen is aiming to take outright ownership of the joint venture, which was first announced in 2022, after five years.

Uría Menéndez
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
Ferrovial, the Spanish infrastructure group, was advised by the firm on a contentious plan to shift its head office to the Netherlands despite opposition from the Madrid government. The move, which won support from shareholders in April 2023, has been followed by a listing of shares in the US in addition to Amsterdam and Spain.

Commended

Asters
O: 6; L: 5; I: 9; Total: 20
The firm advised Ukrainian football club Shakhtar Donetsk on commercial arrangements for being hosted by German team Hamburg for its European fixtures.

Assisted by German law firm Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek, lawyers negotiated with German tax regulators to mitigate tax paid by both clubs to help Shakhtar, exiled from its ground in the Donbas region since Russia invaded in 2014, to fulfil games in non-domestic competitions.

Baker McKenzie
O: 6; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 20
The firm advised Swiss speciality chemicals group Sika on its €5.3bn acquisition of rival MBCC, previously part of German chemical giant BASF, from private equity owner Lone Star Funds. The deal was first announced in 2021 and completed in May last year after securing 18 antitrust clearances across six jurisdictions.

Sorainen
O: 7; L: 7; I: 6; Total: 20
The firm represented AstraZeneca in striking a partnership with public health authorities in Estonia to improve care for lung cancer patients. AstraZeneca signed the deal in January 2023, alongside other drugmakers. Commended individual: Lise-Lotte Lääne

Travers Smith
O: 7; L: 6; I: 6; Total: 19
The firm advised UK-based investment company Zegona Communications on acquiring Vodafone’s Spanish mobile phone division for up to €5bn. Zegona, founded in 2015, agreed to pay at least €4.1bn in cash for the business, which controls almost a quarter of the Spanish market.

Standout

White & Case: Winner
Originality: 9; Leadership: 9; Impact: 6; Total: 24
Last year, the firm extended its work with the Liquidity and Sustainability Facility, a UN-backed scheme that aims to ease trading in African sovereign debt among private investors and cut borrowing costs.

White & Case first worked pro bono with the UN Economic Commission for Africa and the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) on creating the LSF in 2021, to encourage the growth of a so-called “repo” or repurchase market, in which sovereign debt on the continent can be temporarily loaned out at profit. In 2023, the firm advised LSF on its second deal when the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and Afreximbank committed to a $100mn repo borrowing facility.

Highly commended

Aequo
O: 8; L: 8; I: 7; Total: 23
The Kyiv-based firm assisted the International Finance Corporation, the private sector-focused arm of the World Bank, and the US Agency for International Development in their efforts to help the Ukrainian government to sell off state farmland.

This included advising on the controversial ending, in 2021, of a near 20-year ban on individuals purchasing, rather than leasing, small plots. This year, rules were further relaxed to allow local and western investors to buy units of up to 10,000 hectares.

Gide Loyrette Nouel
O: 7; L: 8; I: 8; Total: 23
In 2023, the French firm helped the International Finance Corporation to create a pioneering energy-sector social bond — designed to fund projects that have social benefits — in the West African Economic and Monetary Union region. The $98mn bond will fund Ivory Coast’s “Electricity for all” programme, which will help electrify up to 800,000 poor rural households.

Mayer Brown
O: 7; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 21
The firm helped mining company Cornish Lithium secure $67mn of financing last year, including £24mn from the state-backed UK Infrastructure Bank, which was its first direct equity investment. The start-up aims to extract the metal, used in electric car battery production, from late 2026.

Commended

Asters
O: 6; L: 5; I: 9; Total: 20
The Ukrainian firm worked pro bono for the country’s export credit agency to help shipowners and ship charterers with a deal, struck in January, to improve insurance cover for the war risks of transporting goods through the Black Sea.

Dechert
O: 7; L: 7; I: 6; Total: 20
The firm advised Oman state-owned energy company EDO in its launch last September of a $1bn Islamic “sukuk” bond. The firm advised on a structure that created payment guarantees that were clearly compliant with the sultanate’s sharia laws on financing and which also helped bolster the deal’s credit rating.

Dentons
O: 6; L: 8; I: 6; Total: 20
The firm helped Ecuador strike the largest so-called debt-for-nature swap to date. This deal, struck in April last year, allowed the country to write down sovereign debt by exchanging $1.63bn of bonds for a $656mn loan on more favourable terms, on condition that it committed $323mn of the money saved to conservation efforts on the Galápagos Islands.

White & Case
O: 6; L: 8; I: 6; Total: 20
The firm advised Gabon on a $500mn debt-for-nature swap agreed in August last year. The deal lowered the interest rate on the country’s debts and gave it longer to make repayments, if it spends at least $125mn on widening a marine reserve and strengthening fishing regulations.

Borenius Attorneys
O: 5; L: 7; I: 7; Total: 19
The firm led the Finnish American Chamber of Commerce’s working group in drafting policy reforms for attracting foreign direct investment to Finland. These include allowing companies to invest more easily in new industrial developments by funding projects to tackle water pollution. Commended individual: Casper Herler