financial institutions

Schoenherr's experts advise financial institutions on all legal questions emerging across CEE.

"It’s a top-class firm. Schoenherr is a full-service firm and are a top firm for transactions of all kinds."
Chambers 2020

Rapidly changing regulatory environments, disruptive technologies and global economic uncertainties are some of the challenges faced by financial institutions. Schoenherr has a leading practice, both on a cross-border/international level and national level in each of its jurisdictions, advising our financial institution clients across CEE/SEE and beyond on a broad spectrum of matters that go to the core of their businesses.

Relevant areas include transactions (debt and equity, including financial institutions consolidation), regulatory matters (including proceedings in front of national and European regulatory authorities), resolution and restructuring, outsourcing, corporate governance, dispute resolution, investigations, compliance and reputational risk management as well as legal assistance in day-to-day operations.

Our clients include banking organisations and investment banks, private equity and hedge funds, real estate investment funds, investment advisers, fund and asset managers, broker dealers, development banks and export credit agencies, sovereign wealth funds, insurance companies, fintechs, payment services providers, outsourcing and other third-party service providers and other participants in the financial sector. We work with many of the leading EU, global and regional international financial institutions active in CEE/SEE.

Chambers (2020), IFLR1000 (2021), Legal 500 (2020) and Germany's JUVE (2020) have all ranked Schoenherr's banking and finance practice as top tier.

our services

Schoenherr advises financial institutions on a broad spectrum of legal matters, including:

banking law and banking regulation, including CRR
financial services and securities regulation
pension funds regulation
insurance supervisory, governance, contracts/products and litigation
trading platforms / MTFs regulation
asset and fund management
payments services and systems, market infrastructure providers
fintech, including crypto assets / cryptocurrencies regulation and payment services
set-up, licensing and daily operations for banking and non-banking financial institutions
regulatory compliance, risk management and assistance in extraordinary circumstances / crisis management
executive compensation and employment matters
outsourcing/insourcing strategies and implementation
regulatory capital and own funds legal advice
financial institution consolidation, including mergers, acquisitions and ownership control proceedings
internal governance legal advice and corporate reorganisations
loan sales and other forms of deleveraging, portfolio transactions and special situations
securitisations (true sale and synthetic of various asset classes, incl. loan, leasing and trade receivables)
bank recovery and resolution as well as recovery and resolution planning
financial services litigation, including in front of regulatory authorities
investigations, including governmental enforcement proceedings
regulatory change initiatives
lender liability and other commercial dispute resolution
all forms of capital markets, structured finance and derivatives transactions
derivatives and other financial products litigation
debt finance products, including leveraged lending, project, asset and trade finance
consumer lending, including prepaid cards, e-wallets and other legal aspects of cryptocurrencies
restructurings, work-outs and insolvencies