Like its US contemporaries in tier two Cravath is viewed in the London market as a high quality team whose only handicap is the depth of its London operation. "Cravath are a great team but rather stretched," says one peer....
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Like its US contemporaries in tier two Cravath is viewed in the London market as a high quality team whose only handicap is the depth of its London operation. "Cravath are a great team but rather stretched," says one peer.
Philip Boeckman leads the team and is part of a small group of senior New York high-yield lawyers in London who have been in the market for a considerable time and are seen as an experienced and safe pair of hands. "Philip is the leading high-yield partner in London," says one client. "It was a first class service from Cravath. One of the leading underwriter, high-yield firms in London, quality partner attention, extremely well trained supervision and a high standard of lawyers." Another client agrees: "Philip's particularly good, they are market leaders in new structures and new transactions. Very well recognised in the market."
The team's past experience includes the landmark Brake Bros transaction in 2002-3, which has been quoted recently as an example of buyside demands in light of the issues raised by the European Leveraged Finance Buyside Forum letter.
Last year the firm had a strong pipeline of mandates acting for initial purchasers. One example saw the team act for the purchasers led by Deutsche and BNP Paribas on the SFr300 million (€278.2 million), €371 million and €505 million tranches of a debt offering by Sunrise Communications International and its holding company. The team also advised the holding company on a further €56 million issuance following its acquisition by CVC. The latter formed part of one of Europe's largest LBO's since the financial crash.
A similar deal saw Boeckman and Alyssa Caples act for Picard Bondco on a €300 million debt offering and Picard PIKco on a €38 million private placement.
With European issuers a new and novel part of the market, Cravath took advantage advising Morgan Stanley and RBS on the English law aspects of BAA's (the holding company of Gatwick and Stansted airports) £325 million debt offering on the LSE.
Similar work arose from JPMorgan and Credit Suisse who the team advised on the largest Sterling denominated high-yield issue to date, an offering of £520 million by insurance firm Towergate. Completed in January 2011, the deal came after the company had been forced to abandon an intitial issue in 2010 following the closure of the market.
Restructuring utilising high-yield has been a big source of work and in this area Cravath again through Boeckman acted for Deutsche, Citi, Credit Suisse, Goldman, JPMorgan and UniCredit on Hapag-Lloyd's €480 million and $250 million dual issue which formed part of the shipping companies restructuring.
"They're well organised, they are thoughtful and well prepared," says one peer.
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