Mayer Brown has hired Stephen Rooney for its New York office as a partner and co-leader of its insurance finance group.
He is also a member of the firm’s banking and finance practice. Previously, for over 20 years, he was a partner at Dewey & LeBoeuf's corporate insurance practice and was the global chair of its structured finance practice group.
Rooney has represented issuers and underwriters in transactions related to domestic and international securities offerings of equity, debt and hybrid securities such as 144A registered public offerings by non-U.S. issuers and offerings. He has broad experience in negotiating and structuring M&A deals within the insurance and financial services industries. The new hire also counsels domestic and international clients on corporate governance matters and director fiduciary duties.
Structured financings where Rooney was deal counsel include: numerous catastrophe bond offerings; the first securitization of life insurance regulatory reserves; the first securitization of private-equity investment portfolios by an insurance company; the first cross-border credit card future-flow transaction; and the first securitization of insurance policy loans.
“Steve is widely recognized in the insurance industry for the breadth of his transactional experience, including securities offerings, corporate finance, structured finance and M&A, and he is particularly noted for his pioneering work in insurance-linked securities,” said Kenneth Pierce, co-leader of Mayer Brown’s global Insurance Industry Group.
Edward Best, leader of Mayer Brown’s capital markets group, stated, “We are very excited about Steve joining Mayer Brown. He will further strengthen Mayer Brown’s ability to serve our clients and will reinforce our strong position in the worldwide insurance transactional markets.”
“Mayer Brown’s capabilities and global reputation in insurance capital markets, M&A and finance are outstanding, and I am thrilled to have the opportunity to contribute my talents and experience to the Mayer Brown team,” Rooney said.
“Over the past decade and more, Mayer Brown has built a world-class insurance practice with more than 100 lawyers in the US, Europe and Asia offering specific insurance and reinsurance transactional, dispute resolution and regulatory and compliance experience,” said Mayer Brown Chairman Herbert Krueger. “This has included some terrific new lateral partners in recent years. With Steve’s arrival, we are looking forward to continuing to expand our ability to serve the legal needs of insurance industry clients, which is an important and ongoing strategic priority for Mayer Brown.”
Richard Spehr, partner-in-charge of Mayer Brown’s New York office, said: “Steve’s arrival underscores our focus on growth in New York, where we have added more than a dozen lateral partners in the last two years in practices including Capital Markets, Banking & Finance, Corporate & Securities, Real Estate and Restructuring, Bankruptcy & Insolvency.”
