Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft has appointed fund finance practitioners Michael C Mascia and Wesley A Misson as partners.
The addition continues the firm's global expansion, with nine lateral partners and their teams joining the firm to date in 2015, and builds on the firm's significant presence in Charlotte, NC.
Mascia and Misson have a globally recognised practice in subscription credit facilities (SCFs) and fund finance, representing lenders in facilities to many of the world's preeminent real estate and private equity funds. Mascia, previously Co-Head of Mayer Brown's Global Lending Practice, is the founder of the annual Subscription Credit Facility and Fund Finance Symposium and is a founding member and the Secretary of the Funds Finance Association. Misson, who also joins Cadwalader from Mayer Brown, has represented financial institutions as lenders and lead agents in hundreds of SCFs and other fund financings during the course of his career, including serving as lead counsel on many of the largest, most sophisticated SCFs. Both are frequent speakers and authors on fund finance.
"Cadwalader has a long track record of anticipating client needs and evolving through financial industry changes; the addition of Mike and Wes is representative of this mindset," says Pat Quinn, Managing Partner. "The team will help us meet growing market demand as funds continue to increase their need for cost-effective financing, thereby further diversifying our practice globally."
"Cadwalader is excited to acquire the preeminent fund finance practice in our industry, and we welcome the team to our Charlotte office from which we serve so many of our global financial clients," says Stuart Goldstein, head of Cadwalader's Charlotte office and Co-Chair of the Capital Markets practice with Michael Gambro. "Mike and Wes add yet another dimension to our finance practice as we increase our capabilities in asset-backed securities to complement our original, core practices of securitisation, warehouse finance, and real estate and asset-based lending. With a top fund finance practice that can meet increasing interest in specialised products, we not only expand our work with bank clients, we also deepen our relationships with private equity funds."
"Cadwalader offers our team the best platform to support and continue expanding our fund finance practice," says Mascia. "We believe the combination of our business with the firm's leading capabilities in securitisation, real estate and private investment funds will be very beneficial to our clients."
"This is a perfect synergy and win for our clients," says Misson. "Mike and I combine our 21 years of collective experience in the field with Cadwalader's top-notch platform."
With Mascia and Misson, Cadwalader's Charlotte office now has more than 50 attorneys. Earlier this year, Anne Tompkins, former US Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina in Charlotte, joined the firm as a partner in the White Collar Defense and Investigations practice.
The addition of Mascia and Misson to Cadwalader's Capital Markets practice reunites them with former Mayer Brown partners Bruce Bloomingdale, Stephen Day and Jeremiah Wagner. Cadwalader is focused on further expansion of its Capital Markets practice globally and into additional areas of asset-backed securities and lending.
