Mayer Brown is a leading international firm with a strong presence in London. The firm is widely recognised for its leading structured finance and securitisation practice. With 40-plus lawyers globally, the firm offers one of the largest derivatives practices of any firm world-wide. The team advises issuers and investors on CLOs, RMBS, CMBS and trade receivables deals. The London team also handles significant mandates in leveraged and acquisition finance, fund finance, and real estate finance, with a growing profile in private credit and direct lending.

Key clients

Barclays Bank, Banco Santander, ISDA, Fédération des caisses Desjardins du Québec (FCDQ), QNB Bank, Islandsbanki, Goldman Sachs International, CDPQ 

Highlights

The derivatives team, led by partner and global practice head Ed Parker, represented Banco Santander Chile in an innovative credit risk sharing facility. This capital relief transaction involved collaboration with IFC and PGGM to achieve capital relief for the bank while increasing mortgage lending to women in Chile, a financially underserved segment. The transaction utilised derivatives and synthetic securitisation technology. This matter represents a pioneering approach in emerging markets, mobilising private capital alongside MDB investment to enable larger and longer-tenor credit risk sharing facilities. 

Partners Rob Flanigan and Peter Pears led the team advising the United States International Development Finance Corporation (the US government’s international development bank) as political risk insurer in connection with a USD1 billion financing for El Salvador for the repurchase of USD1.031 billion of its outstanding bonds at discount from par. The transaction was the world's largest debt buyback for river conservation and closed in the last quarter of 2024.

James Taylor and Peter Pears also led on Fibabanka's debut additional Tier 1 transaction and tender offer for two tranches of outstanding Tier 2 bonds, highlighting the ability of the Mayer Brown, London team to flexibly manage and co-ordinate large public debt capital markets transactions for its clients. This was the first-ever public sub-benchmark AT1 offering of a Turkish financial institution.

Personnel Changes

In July 2025, Mayer Brown hired three senior partners from Dechert, including leveraged finance duo Philip Butler and David Miles, who previously co-led Dechert’s global leveraged finance practice, and private equity partner Mark Evans.

Structured finance duo Chris McGarry and Adam Farrell, and corporate trustee partner Kevin Ng, both from White & Case, joined in early 2025.

Capital markets partner Bernd Bohr moved to Norton Rose Fulbright in May 2024 and senior associate Robyn Llewellyn joined Cadwalader in February 2025.

Testimonials

2025

“Mayer Brown are especially proficient in covered bonds and they do a lot of work in Europe, including Türkiye. They are the go-to firm for these deals” - Covered bonds

“Mayer Brown are renowned for their structured finance practice, and are top of the market when it comes to securitisation” – Structured finance

“The team have deep technical expertise in CLOs, RMBS and CMBS transactions and are very active in the market” – Derivatives

“The team are very technical, commercial and practical” – Derivatives

“James Taylor is a very capable lawyer and highly recommended” - Covered bonds

“Ed Parker is a leading name in the market for derivatives work” – Derivatives

Testimonials

2024

“Knowledgeable, flexible and commercial” - Asset finance