Rob Little

Rob is Head of Banking & Finance, M&A, and Capital Markets at ASAR and has been with the firm since 1997. With over 30 years of legal experience, including more than 25 years in Kuwait, he advises on a broad range of transactional and regulatory matters, including public-private partnerships, restructuring and insolvency, and general corporate work.

Rob acts for local and international banks, financial institutions, and corporate clients on complex domestic and cross-border transactions, with particular depth in the financial services, infrastructure, and energy sectors.

• Rob acted as Kuwaiti legal counsel to the arrangers and agent on a USD 6 billion syndicated loan facility to Equate Petrochemical Company KSCC. The financing, which included both conventional and Shari’a-compliant facilities, supported the acquisition of MEGlobal and was one of the largest corporate acquisition financings in the Middle East in recent years.
• Rob acted as Kuwaiti counsel to Gulf Investment Corporation on the establishment of the first-ever EMTN programme by a Kuwait-based entity. He continues to advise on various Kuwait-based bond and sukuk programmes, several of which have been nominated for IFLR Debt and Equity Deal of the Year.
• Rob advised the vendor on the USD 477 million sale of Kuwait Energy plc via a Jersey scheme of arrangement to a purchaser listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The transaction was nominated for IFLR’s M&A Deal of the Year in 2019.
• Rob acted for the creditor group on the restructuring of a USD 437 million facility extended to subsidiaries of Adeem Investment and Wealth Management. The bespoke restructuring involved both conventional and Shari’a-compliant elements and spanned multiple jurisdictions. The deal won IFLR’s Restructuring Deal of the Year in 2017.
• Rob has also advised on several large-scale restructurings valued at over USD 4 billion, including matters involving The Investment Dar, Global Investment House, and Aayan Investment Company.

• Banking
• Capital markets: Derivatives
• Capital markets: Equity
• Covered bonds
• M&A
• Restructuring and insolvency
• Structured finance/securitisation

• Banking
• Energy
• Financial services
• Investment management
• Oil and gas

• Bachelor of Laws, 1991, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatchewan, Canada

• Non practicing member of the Law Society of Saskatchewan (Canada),1993