Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer is a world-leading global law firm, where our ambition is to help you achieve your goals.

Exceptional client service and the pursuit of excellence are at our core. We invest in and care about our client relationships, which is why so many are longstanding. We enjoy breaking new ground, as we have for over 170 years.

As a fully integrated transatlantic and transpacific firm, we are where you need us to be. Our footprint is extensive and committed across the world’s largest markets, key financial centres and major growth hubs.

At our best tackling complexity and navigating change, we work alongside you on demanding litigation, exacting regulatory work and complex public and private market transactions. We are recognised as leading in these areas.

We are immersed in the sectors and challenges that impact you. We are recognised as standing apart in energy, infrastructure and resources. And we’re focused on areas of growth that affect every business across the world.

All of this is achieved by supporting the growth of our people, who help us deliver on our ambition – which is to help you achieve yours.

Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer: Your goals. Our ambition

The Opportunity

Practice Area

Financial Services Regulatory (FSR)

Our global FSR practice helps our clients solve their most complex and sensitive national and international regulatory challenges (both proactive and reactive), both non-contentious and contentious.  We have specialists across our network of offices in Europe, North America, Asia-Pacific and the Middle East.

Our expertise covers the full spectrum of regulation, including authorisations and approvals; regulatory change; the regulatory aspects of transactions or restructurings; governance; risk management and compliance; market conduct; complaints handling; financial crime; and enforcement and investigations.

Our lawyers have a broader range of experience than many legal advisers: outstanding technical and professional skills are a prerequisite for our work, but they are not enough on their own. An in-depth understanding of regulatory policy and process and how it impacts on our clients is crucial.

Our regulatory team includes Partners who have previously gained several years' experience working within financial institutions. We have also invested heavily in ensuring that our associates spend time on secondment with clients and with regulators.

The non-contentious part of the FSR practice (within our Corporate Division) specialises in generalist advisory and transactions/commercial projects work. The team advises banks (traditional and challenger), investment firms (including broker-dealers and insurance brokers), asset managers, market infrastructure providers (including CCPs and trading venues), Fintechs, private equity firms and other financial institutions on financial services law and regulation, including all major UK/EU regulatory regimes, including CRR/CRD, MiFID II, SMCR, MAR, EMIR, SSR, CSRD, PSD2, AIFMD etc.

The team regularly advises clients on their most strategic and challenging projects, including:

• structuring and authorisation of new businesses

• Group rationalisation and structuring

• corporate governance and senior management responsibility

• regulatory change and commercial projects (including outsourcing)

• new business and product structuring

• client documentation and other financial sector contracts

• BAU regulatory and compliance matters

• advising on emerging technology like digital assets, tokenisation and AI

• high-value and complex financial sector M&A and other transactions

The lawyers in the non-contentious part of this practice area work closely with their counterparts on the contentious side, sharing client work, business development and know-how.

Recent Matters

• Advising an investment vehicle and its owner on a majority equity investment in Metro Bank as part of the October 2023 rescue of Metro Bank

• Advising the Earthshot Prize (founded by HRH Prince William in 2020, it is an ambitious global environmental prize to discover and scale the best solutions to help repair our planet over the next 10 years) on regulatory issues on a new digital platform. 

• Advising a leading international cross-border bank on its Basel 3:1 implementation.

• Advising a leading global financial services group on ESG related disclosure and greenwashing requirements.

• Advising a number of FinTechs, BigTech and TradFi companies on digital assets/crypto, AI and payments-related regulation.

• Advising a leading challenger bank on prudential requirements.

• Advising global asset managers on product and platform launches.

• Advising on the authorisation of a bank.

• Advising a global bank on CRDVI requirements.

Key responsibilities

• Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer is presently recruiting for an associate in the non-contentious FSR practice (which sits within our wider Corporate Division).

• The role involves both advisory and transactional/commercial projects regulatory work; both UK domestic and international.

• Clients could be across many sectors of the FS industry, both wholesale and retail. Including banks, payment services/e-money firms, interdealer brokers, asset managers, private equity firms, insurers, insurance intermediaries and energy sector clients.

• Non-contentious associates also have the rare and highly valuable opportunity of becoming involved in contentious work, to broaden their experience, if of interest.

Qualifications, skills and experience

• We would expect the successful candidate to have approximately 1-2 years' experience in financial services regulatory work, with experience of dealing with large, complex and multi-jurisdictional matters. We would consider those with less or more experience, providing they meet the required competencies.

• Experience could be in any of the mini-sectors mentioned under Key Responsibilities above; although we expect that the successful candidate is most likely to have a broad spread of experience across several of these sectors.

• Academic excellence is essential for all positions within Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer. We would always expect at least a 2:1 degree (or equivalent). All applications should include full academic details including grades, subjects and transcripts where appropriate.

• Fluency in spoken and written English.

Competencies

• Personal Leadership

• Builds Authentic Relationships

• Collaborates with others

• Enhances the Client Experience

• Achieves Results

Team

Location

Contract type

Diversity & Inclusion

We are committed to attracting people from all backgrounds and creating a respectful and inclusive culture where everyone thrives. We see this as essential to our success, including our ability to innovate and achieve sustained high performance. This is a key part of our Values—Human, Bold, and Outstanding.