Legal adviser league tables for 2003 confirm Mallesons Stephen Jaques’ reputation for delivering results for clients. Thomson Financial noted that the firm completed the most (52) M&A deals in Asia-Pacific, with a combined value of US$23.992 billion. In project finance the firm closed the most (23) deals in 2003 in the region, with a combined value of US$2.403 billion, as recorded by Dealogic.

With the increased complexity of transactions, closing a deal now requires a greater depth and breadth of talent with knowledge in areas including regulatory, financing, tax and other specialist areas.

These results reflect Mallesons’ regional credentials and the firm’s unstinting capability for working in unified teams across practice areas to ‘get the deals through’ for clients.

One of the main features of many of the firm’s keynote M&A deals in 2003 is their cross-border nature. Such deals include:

• Promina IPO
• Xstrata/MIM
• AMP Demerger
• AMP Defender (Shearwater)
• CSR/Rinker Demerger
• The Telstra share buy back
• Glencore/Anaconda Nickel
• IAG/CGU, NZI
• China Huaneng Group/OzGen (InterGen)

M&A partner David Friedlander is confident that the high level of activity will continue into 2004.

“The firm’s capability in the area of complex financing arrangements for transactions with use of the global equity markets, hybrid notes and other novel products has enabled us to establish a firm foothold on the number of deals in which we have involvement.

“During 2003 the Promina float kick-started the equities markets, both here and offshore, giving great confidence to M&A activity reliant on capital raisings for finance. The Xstrata/MIM deal marked yet another episode in the ‘see-saw’ status of schemes of arrangement as the primary implementation route for friendly takeovers in Australia.

“With last year’s M&A activity soaring well above 2002 levels, this augurs well for the first half of 2004,” concluded David Friedlander.

Peter Doyle, Mallesons’ head of project finance, said: “The firm has experienced significant levels of activity across the project finance practice with involvement in many of the most significant deals for 2003, including Australasia’s largest project financing of the year, the Western Sydney Orbital Motorway Project.

“We will continue our strong commitment to providing high quality project finance advice across the breadth of jurisdictions in Asia Pacific and extend our thanks to clients for their continued support,” he said.

THOMSON FINANCIAL M&A LEGAL ADVISER LEAGUE TABLE
2003 Any Asia Pacific Involvement, excluding Japan - Completed
(Ranked by deal number)

DEALOGIC PROJECT FINANCE LEGAL ADVISER LEAGUE TABLE
2003 Asia Pacific
(Ranked by deal number)