Katten Muchin Rosenman has boosted its financial services offering in London with the hire of a trio of partners from Curtis Mallet-Prevost Colt & Mosle.  

Financial markets and funds duo Thomas Laurer and Ryan Hansen alongside transactional tax planning lawyer Daniel Lewin have joined 700-lawyer Katten’s UK LLP having previously co-led Curtis’s investment management practice in London. Laurer and Hansen moved from that firm’s New York office to London in 2013 and 2017, respectively, with Lewin joining them two years ago.

The team advises UK, US, and international investment managers and family offices on their global operations, portfolio investments and other corporate transactions, including investment management group structuring and formation and marketing of hedge, private equity, venture capital and other private funds.

They also work with emerging companies to raise capital from US and international investors, establish UK and US operations or ownership structures and otherwise navigate the legal, regulatory and tax challenges associated with growing a cross-border business.

Katten’s London managing partner, Christopher Hitchins, said the trio’s transatlantic investments and financings expertise “aligns perfectly with Katten’s existing offerings and provides the entire firm with opportunity for greater synergy”.

“The growth of our financial services and funds platform is an integral part of our overall strategic focus, and the appointment of this new team advances that growth,” he added. “Together, we will continue to provide our clients with the first-class transatlantic service that they have come to expect from the teams at Katten.”

The trio’s arrival at Katten will take the firm’s London partner headcount to 20, including nine in the firm’s financial markets and funds team, among a wider team of more than 40 lawyers.  

Katten’s London office has continued to grow during Hitchins’ three years as MP, having more than tripled in size during his predecessor Peter Sugden’s nine years at the helm.  

The firm also bolstered its funds team in 2022 when Alice Bell rejoined as a partner from Pinsent Masons, and in the same year added corporate partner Oliver Williams from PwC.  

A number of US firms have boosted their funds offering in London recently, including Skadden, which hired a trio of funds lawyers from Debevoise earlier this month led by Delphine Jaugey, who will serve as Skadden’s head of secondaries for Europe.  

Late last year Simpson Thacher also hired fund finance partner Katie McMenamin from leading UK independent Travers Smith, having hired partners Ed Ford and Sacha Gofton-Salmond from Travers earlier in the year as it positioned itself to exploit the increasingly lucrative secondaries deal market.  

And last July Latham & Watkins hired private funds partner Mateja Maher in London from Sidley Austin, alongside newly-minted partner Adrian Grocock.