Morais Leitão Galvão Teles Soares da Silva & Associados (MLGTS) has maintained a solid team and keeps its rankings across the board. A projects client says the firm provides “good quality, permanent availability, senior staff involvement in the process, good relationship and a capacity to give tactical advice”. “Exceptional,” says another for a refinancing, while a restructuring client says the firm gave “excellent service in an extremely complex and tough negotiation”. “I consider them as the best law firm in Portugal,” says a debt capital markets client. Over 2013-14 the firm won numerous instructions from domestic and foreign Portuguese banks, in some examples advising a syndicate on the restructuring of the debt of a wine producer, a Portuguese bank on the €117 million debt restructuring of a Portuguese media company and two Portuguese banks on the restructuring of a football club. The team also received various mandates for the Portuguese Treasury and Debt Management Agency (IGCP) relating to derivatives matters and regular project finance and bank refinancing instructions from Banco Espírito Santo de Investimento throughout 2013 and 2014.

Morais Leitão Galvão Teles Soares da Silva & Associados (MLGTS) has maintained a solid team and keeps its rankings across the board. A projects client says the firm provides “good quality, permanent availability, senior staff involvement in the process, good relationship and a capacity to give tactical advice”. “Exceptional,” says another for a refinancing, while a restructuring client says the firm gave “excellent service in an extremely complex and tough negotiation”. “I consider them as the best law firm in Portugal,” says a debt capital markets client. Over 2013-14 the firm won numerous instructions from domestic and foreign Portuguese banks, in some examples advising a syndicate on the restructuring of the debt of a wine producer, a Portuguese bank on the €117 million debt restructuring of a Portuguese media company and two Portuguese banks on the restructuring of a football club. The team also received various mandates for the Portuguese Treasury and Debt Management Agency (IGCP) relating to derivatives matters and regular project finance and bank refinancing instructions from Banco Espírito Santo de Investimento throughout 2013 and 2014. The firm was very active on the debt capital markets side and in some representative deals it advised Banco Santander Totta on the issue of €1 billion 1.5% covered bonds due 2017 within its covered bonds programme, Brisa Concessao Rodoviaria on its €350 million issue of 3.875% fixed rate notes under its EMTN programme and Energías de Portugal (EDP) on its €200 million floating rate instruments due December 2014. One notable mandate saw the firm advise JPMorgan Securities and other dealers in the structuring and implementation of Galp Energia €5 billion EMTN programme.

The team also received various mandates for the Portuguese Treasury and Debt Management Agency (IGCP) relating to derivatives matters and regular project finance and bank refinancing instructions from Banco Espírito Santo de Investimento throughout 2013 and 2014. A projects client says the firm provides “good quality, permanent availability, senior staff involvement in the process, good relationship and a capacity to give tactical advice”.

The firm was very active on the debt capital markets side and in some representative deals it advised Banco Santander Totta on the issue of €1 billion 1.5% covered bonds due 2017 within its covered bonds programme, Brisa Concessao Rodoviaria on its €350 million issue of 3.875% fixed rate notes under its EMTN programme and Energías de Portugal (EDP) on its €200 million floating rate instruments due December 2014. One notable mandate saw the firm advise JPMorgan Securities and other dealers in the structuring and implementation of Galp Energia €5 billion EMTN programme.

Clients remain enthusiastic about the firm’s corporate practice. The team “demonstrated an incredible knowledge on all the subjects this work covered,” says one M&A client, while others note the firm has “good knowledge of the client needs, very practical lawyers” and “seeks the solution and not the problem”. In highlight deals the firm, alongside Skadden Arps and Houthoff Buruma, continued to advise Portugal’s largest construction company Mota Engil in its plan to sell shares in its African subsidiary (43% of the company’s revenue) through an IPO in London to raise capital. In mid-2014 the company announced it would postpone the listing. The firm also advised Sonaecom in relation to a €215 million tender offer by its own board of directors in exchange for Zon Optimus shares, completed in 2014 with an acceptance level of 62%. Elsewhere, the team assisted Banco Commercial Portugues on the sale of its stake in Millennium Bank Greece and investment into a Piraeus Bank capital increase and advised state-owned Caixa Geral de Depósitos (CGD) on the privatisation of Portugal’s largest insurer Caixa Seguros to China’s biggest private conglomerate Fosun International for €1.2 billion On the private equity side the firm won numerous mandates from ECS and in 2013-14 advised Vallis Capital Partners on its investments into companies in the construction, public works and engineering sectors under financial distress totalling €1 billion. The team was also supporting EU Steel on its judicial recovery procedure (PER) and recovery plan.