Hogan Lovells has hired a five-lawyer finance team to strengthen its finance and capital markets offering in Brussels post-Brexit.  

Ivan Peeters and Philip Van Steenwinkel are joining the firm as partners from PwC Legal alongside three associates. Peeters and Van Steenwinkel have been at PwC since 2018, when they joined from Benelux heavyweight Stibbe.  

Peeters headed Stibbe’s finance practice in Brussels for 11 years prior to joining the Big Four firm’s legal arm. His practice focuses on advising on financial transactions, structured financing, capital markets and securities regulations, restructurings and financial sector regulations. He has also made regular contributions to the development of Belgian legislation, including in relation to covered bonds, securitisation, collateral agreements and securities.  

Meanwhile, Van Steenwinkel specialises in advising on various aspects of financial law, including capital market transactions, structured finance and derivatives as well as other financial products. Van Steenwinkel spent 11 years as counsel at Stibbe before jumping to PwC in 2018.  

Prior to joining PwC, the veteran finance duo worked at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer’s Brussels office. Peeters spent 15 years as a partner at Freshfields, including three years as the Brussels office’s managing partner, while Van Steenwinkel spent five years with the magic circle giant as an associate.  

Peeters also spent five years as in-house counsel at KBC, which he joined in 1986, according to his LinkedIn profile.  

David Gibbons, global head of Hogan Lovells’ corporate and finance practice, said: “The addition of Ivan and Philip to our finance and capital markets team is an important step in our effort to strengthen our finance offering in Brussels particularly in the context of Brexit.”  

Peeters and Van Steenwinkel are the latest in a string of lateral European hires for the firm, following the arrival of London-based litigation team from Debevoise & Plimpton in February and the addition of former White & Case M&A lawyer Patrick Sarch, who joined Hogan Lovells to co-lead its London M&A practice alongside Ben Higson.  

Commenting on their move, the duo said: “We have worked with members of the Hogan Lovells network in the past and were always impressed by the firm's high quality client service and the strength of its global platform. We see strong synergies with the Hogan Lovells offering. We are very excited to join and work with the team to continue to grow the firm’s finance capabilities cross- border and in the Belgian market generally.” 

Earlier this year, Hogan Lovells hired a team of seven M&A and private equity lawyers from Baker McKenzie in Paris in an effort to strengthen its global deal advisory business.  

Last June, private equity partners Ed Harris, Leanne Moezi and Adam Brown all rejoined Hogan Lovells less than a year after joining Paul Hastings. Harris and Moezi are based in London and Brown is based in Northern Virginia. In July, the firm also hired private equity lawyers Don Williams, Tony Mou and Cheng Xu from Sheppard Mullin in Shanghai, with Nikolai Sokolov arriving in Frankfurt from Allen & Overy at the start of November.