James J. Barresi chairs the firm’s Global Financial Services Practice Group. He advises financial institutions, private equity funds, hedge funds and corporations in corporate and commercial finance matters, mergers and acquisitions, and complex investment and finance transactions including transactions involving derivative instruments. Mr. Barresi has substantial experience in the acquisition of troubled financial institutions and distressed companies and in managing exposure to troubled financial institutions.

Immediately prior to joining Squire Sanders, Mr. Barresi served as senior vice president and deputy general counsel of one of the largest and most acquisitive bank holding companies in the United States.

Mr. Barresi is listed in The Best Lawyers in America. He is a member of the Business Law Section of the American Bar Association and its committees on Banking Law, Business Financing, and Mergers and Acquisitions. Mr. Barresi is a member of the executive committee of the board of directors of Central Clinic.

Reprezentatívne skúsenosti

Corporate Finance and Investments

• Representing the US Department of Treasury in connection with its TARP Capital Purchase Program and in making several hundred investments in US financial institutions since October 2008.
• Representing three of the largest bank holding companies in the United States and several regional bank holding companies in raising more than US$25 billion in capital and liquidity since June 2008. Transactions included public offerings and private placements of common stock, preferred stock, convertible preferred stock, enhanced trust preferred securities, subordinated debt, guaranteed (TLGP) and non-guaranteed senior debt and debt/equity exchange offers.
• Representing four bank holding companies and two energy companies in numerous groundbreaking issuances of “new” hybrid securities totaling more than US$25 billion including the first such transaction approved by the Federal Reserve in December 2005.
• Advising multiple leading financial institutions in developing bank note programs, medium term note programs and commercial paper programs and in related issuances in the United States, Europe and Canada.
• Advising underwriters in offerings of equity and debt securities by several bank holding companies, insurance companies and specialty finance companies.
• Advising a hedge fund and CDO sponsor in restructuring several large investments in asset-backed securities issued by C-BASS.
• Advising four public commodity pools in managing exposure to Refco, Inc.
• Advising a high-yield fund sponsored by JPMorgan in a structured investment in a distressed debt hedge fund.
• Advising several multinational corporations and leading financial institutions in unwinding derivative and other financial transactions with Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers in 2008 and 2009.
• Representing several lenders and borrowers in syndicated loan transactions including cross-border, leveraged acquisition financings involving multicurrency loans and senior and subordinated debt.

Mergers and Acquisitions

• Advising two regional banks in acquiring failed banks in FDIC assisted and unassisted transactions.
• Advising several regional banks in mergers, acquisitions and dispositions including four acquisitions of troubled institutions and transactions involving loan portfolios, branches, broker dealers, trust companies and insurance agencies.
• Representing three private equity funds in multiple leveraged acquisitions and divestitures and in financing such acquisitions.
• Advising a multinational conglomerate in the sale of its assets in numerous simultaneous transactions in connection with its restructuring.
• Advising a multinational conglomerate in the sale of a substantial portion of its assets in connection with a reorganization.
• Representing a multinational conglomerate in the sale of a division including a foreign subsidiary.

Sample Articles

• Hybrid Securities: An Increasingly Popular Financing Tool,” Infrastructure, ABA Section of Public Utility, Communications and Transportation Law, Vol. 46, No. 4, Summer 2007.
• “Preserving a Debtor’s Derivatives Portfolio in US Bankruptcy/UK Administration,” Financier Worldwide: Corporate Finance Intelligence, March 27, 2005.
• “Federal Reserve Board Issues Final Rule for Trust Preferred Securities,” available at www.ssd.com, March 2005.