Paul Hastings and Weil have been called for the $22.8bn sale of CK Hutchison’s ports business to a consortium led by BlackRock, according to sources familiar with the matter, in a deal that will see the transfer of two major ports on the Panama Canal. 

GLP understands Paul Hastings is advising CK Hutchison, the conglomerate owned by Hong Kong’s richest man, Li Ka-shing, and his family. Meantime Weil is guiding the consortium, which also includes BlackRock-owned Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) and Terminal Investment Limited, the shipping giant controlled by Italy’s Aponte family. 

The group will acquire a 90% stake in the company that owns and operates the Panama Canal ports, called Balboa and Cristóbal. As part of the deal it will also take an 80% stake in CK Hutchison’s ports subsidiaries, which own 43 ports across the globe. 

The Paul Hastings team advising CK Hutchison is understood to be led by New York-based Eduardo Gallardo, global co-chair of the firm’s M&A practice, and London corporate partner Matthew Poxon. The deal is a significant mandate for the firm, which ranked 23rd in London Stock Exchange Group’s global M&A legal advisor rankings in 2024 after working on deals worth just over $76bn. The year before the firm had placed 66th. 

CK Hutchison has looked to UK Magic Circle firms Linklaters and Freshfields to advise it on a number of major deals in the past. Linklaters guided the merger of its subsidiary Three UK with Vodafone’s UK business in 2023, while in 2021 Freshfields led the $6bn merger of its Indonesian telecoms business, Hutchison 3 Indonesia, with a subsidiary of Qatar’s Ooredoo Group. 

Meantime, the Weil team acting for the consortium is understood to be led by London-based M&A partners Murray Cox and private equity infrastructure partner Brendan Moylan, according to sources familiar with the matter. The firm has acted for BlackRock, which has $11.6trn in assets under management, on numerous past matters, including its $300m investment in AI company DDN earlier this year. 

BlackRock turned to Skadden and Fried Frank last year for the $12.5bn acquisition of GIP, as it moved to become a powerhouse in alternative asset investing. GIP was counselled on the matter by Kirkland & Ellis and Debevoise & Plimpton. 

The deal for CK Hutchison’s ports businesses came amid pressure from Donald Trump’s administration over alleged Chinese influence on the Panama Canal and repeated calls by Trump for the US to “retake control” of the waterway, the Financial Times reported. BlackRock chief executive, Larry Fink, briefed senior figures in the Trump administration to secure their backing for the deal, according to the Financial Times. 

CK Hutchison said it expected to receive cash in excess of $19bn from the deal following the repayment of some shareholder loans.  

Bloomberg reported Wednesday (5 March) that Goldman Sachs is currently the only investment bank working on the deal. 

Paul Hasting and Weil did not comment.