Our clients – many of the world’s leading commercial and investment banks and other financial institutions – are pursuing bold strategies:
- Winning dominance in hotly contested markets
- Developing new products and services to meet customers’ expanding needs
- Building multinational distribution networks
- Leveraging synergies between their investment banking and other operations
We help our clients manage their diverse operations, build global brands, and raise capital by providing value-added strategic advice to their local and home country management. We work with clients to build productive relationships with regulators at all levels – including supranational regulatory authorities – when they are planning geographic or service expansions or refocusing their operations.
Among the strategic and comprehensive services provided by our Bank Advisory group are:
Organization Structure and Domicile
White & Case advises U.S. and non-U.S. institutions with respect to alternative forms of organization and domiciles. Our insights are the result of decades of experience representing clients that are extraordinarily diverse in size, home country and business strategy. Accordingly, we are able to alert clients to every factor they need to consider – from long-term implications to short-term factors such as organizational costs, timing, and “below the water line” hazards in the regulatory application process.
Internal Controls and Compliance
We work with clients to evaluate and strengthen their internal controls, risk management processes, and compliance programs – coordinating our efforts with their internal and external accountants and other professional advisors. We have extensive experience with internal investigations and in negotiating settlements of enforcement actions by banking, law enforcement, and securities regulators.
Permissible Activities
We consistently help clients achieve their business objectives within the constraints of the myriad of banking, securities, tax, and other laws to which they are subject. Today, for example, a number of our clients are significant players in the global capital marketplace because of our success in helping them secure essential regulatory approvals.
Regulatory Relationship Management
The lawyers in our Bank Advisory group have strong relationships with all major bank regulators, including, in the United States, the Federal Reserve, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the New York State Banking Department, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and the Department of Justice. In many important financial centers –– including the U.S., throughout the European Union, Japan, Hong Kong, and Mexico –– we help clients maintain their own effective relationships with their regulators.
Corporate Governance
We advise boards of directors, general counsel, chief compliance officers, and other executives on the legal issues that affect their competitiveness. For example:
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Securities law: We offer pragmatic solutions to the array of securities-related issues confronting banking organizations and their subsidiaries; for example, disclosure and filing requirements, insider trading rules, short-swing profit rules, and takeover defense strategies and programs.
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Capital raising: By providing advice on tax, securities, and other considerations, we pave the way for clients seeking access to the capital markets through the most advantageous means, including obtaining favorable regulatory capital treatment, and optimum tax effects.
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Employment matters: Competition for star bankers and brokers is fierce, and clients often rely on us to avoid litigation with the prior employers, facilitate expatriate hires, and structure employment programs. On a broader scale, we help our clients shape their human resources approaches to reflect best practices with regard to discrimination and other issues.
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Intellectual property: Issues of privacy, data protection, trademark protection, antispam regulations, business method patent protection, and other intellectual property concerns deserve boardroom-level attention and, in the leading banks, they’re getting it. Working with our Intellectual Property group – one of the first established by any full-service law firm – we vigilantly protect our clients’ trademarks and other intellectual assets. Our lawyers guide them through the proliferation of privacy and data protection laws, and help them exploit the potential – and minimize the risks – of Internet-enabled distribution and self-service.
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