Financial Services Corporate, Regulatory, Compliance & Transactions

The recently enacted Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 has created many significant, complex and far-reaching changes in the financial sector. Perkins Coie's Financial Services group has closely followed the legislation and related rulemaking in order to help financial services firms understand, prepare for and comply with the changing regulatory landscape. (Read all of our updates on The Financial Reform Act.) The practice brings together attorneys with considerable experience in the financial services industry—including lawyers who served in significant leadership positions at organizations such as Russell Investments, Washington Mutual, Fannie Mae and U.S. Bancorp—to counsel clients on a variety of governance, regulatory, compliance and enforcement, transactional, insolvency and general corporate matters.

We advise and counsel financial services clients regarding a variety of legal matters:

• Corporate governance matters, including the roles and responsibilities of the board and board committees, board and management fiduciary duties, director and executive liability and indemnification agreements, and the implementation of risk management and compliance programs.
• Compliance with and best practices under Securities and Exchange Commission regulatory requirements.
• Compliance with the Investment Company Act of 1940 and the Investment Advisers Act of 1940.
• Civil and criminal investigations and enforcement matters related to compliance with securities laws, fair lending laws, consumer protection, government securities trading, government ethics rules and other matters.
• Corporate transactions and finance, including mergers, acquisitions and divestitures; private financings, public securities offerings, and other capital markets transactions; recapitalizations, including those involving private equity investments; and restructurings, workouts and insolvency matters.
• Commercial lending and bank finance transactions, including secured and unsecured loans, revolving credit facilities, asset-based loans, loan syndications and participations, mezzanine loans, securitization transactions, commercial real estate financing and commercial mortgage-backed securities.
• Compliance with consumer protection, fair lending and other financial institutions-related laws and regulations as set forth by federal and state agencies and SROs, such as the Federal Reserve, CFPB, OCC, OTS, FDIC, FINCEN, FINRA and CFTC.
• Electronic commerce transactions, including payment matters related to traditional and emerging payment systems, services and products.
• Compliance with financial privacy and data security laws and regulations, including Title V of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and state financial privacy laws.