Restructuring Practice

We have one of the leading restructuring practices in the nation, principally representing creditors in national and multinational bankruptcy cases and out-of-court restructurings. In addition, attorneys in our restructuring and finance group regularly handle complicated acquisitions or divestitures of businesses in financial distress or bankruptcy, highly-leveraged transactions and other major transactions involving significant debtor/creditor issues.

Our group's specialized litigators handle high-profile litigation matters involving bankruptcy, restructuring and finance issues. Current matters include representing JPMorgan Chase in multi-billion dollar litigations in the Lehman Brothers and Madoff bankruptcy cases, and representing Credit Suisse in multiple lawsuits arising in the Thornburg Mortgage and NCFE bankruptcy cases.  Significant prior engagements include VFB LLC v. Campbell Soup (successfully defending Campbell Soup and affiliates against a $500 million fraudulent conveyance and breach of fiduciary duty lawsuit arising from the spin-off of its Vlasic Foods specialty food business, which subsequently filed chapter 11); representing the senior secured lenders in the contested plan confirmation in Spectrum Brands’ chapter 11 case (involving issues of first impression regarding the reinstatement of senior debt); procuring a litigated termination of plan exclusivity in the Pliant chapter 11 case; and representing the agent for the first lien lenders supporting, over the objection of the second lien lenders, a successful section 363 sale of the power generating facilities of Boston Generating.

Financing Practice

Wachtell Lipton has a market-leading financing practice, with extensive experience in all types of leveraged and investment grade acquisition and other important financing transactions, including senior secured facilities, bridge facilities, Rule144A and registered high yield and investment grade bond offerings, tender offers, exchange offers and consent solicitations. 

Our financing practice is an integral part of our merger and acquisition practice; our financing lawyers work as a team with our corporate, tax and other attorneys on some of the most complicated, high-profile transactions in the U.S. and around the world. We provide innovation and leadership to enable our clients to meet their most important objectives.  The depth of our market exposure allows us to ensure that our corporate and private-equity clients benefit from the latest financing market trends and techniques — a particular advantage when, as now, financing markets are evolving quickly. 

In leveraged buyouts, Wachtell Lipton is a pioneer in developing acquisition financing platforms that help our clients weather ups and downs in the business cycle.  Our financing practice was on the leading edge of creating covenant-lite financing packages in the last LBO cycle, and we are at the forefront of advising clients on adapting to the post-credit crunch financing environment.  Our expertise in acquisitions allows us to anticipate future needs of our clients and build in flexibility to allow them to execute on their business plans and to grow, organically and through acquisitions. Because our clients are borrowers and issuers, rather than underwriters, we are able to achieve favorable terms in our financings. 

Many of our financings extend across multiple national borders, and we are experienced in solving the complex issues that arise in multi-national situations and in making sure that cross-border transactions benefit from the latest developments in the financing markets, which often originate in New York.  We have led financings involving Europe, Asia, Latin America and Australia.

Wachtell Lipton takes a unified approach to financing; bank financings and capital markets transactions are handled by a single team, resulting in a high level of coordination and execution on multiple-part financings, alignment of covenant packages across the capital structure, the adoption of best practices across financing types and effective comparison of financing alternatives.  We move quickly to capitalize on strong financing markets and meet tight transaction timelines.  

Additionally, each partner in our financing practice has devoted significant time to bankruptcy and restructuring matters, providing us with real-world knowledge of how capital structures work under stress, and enabling us to anticipate and respond to contingencies, and help our clients throughout the life-cycle of their investments.