Corporate Trust Services

Pillsbury’s Corporate Trust team is focused on representing and advising financial and other institutions in a wide variety of commercial financing, fiduciary and securities matters, and in particular advising corporate trustees in all aspects of their trust, fiduciary, custodial, administrative, and agency business in traditional corporate capital markets and in complex global finance transactions, including all varieties of corporate debt offerings, structured finance vehicles, project and energy finance, syndicated loan facilities, DIP financings, and any attendant defaults and default administration, workouts, litigation, and bankruptcies. As a result of our diverse, multidisciplinary approach to the representation of corporate trustees in new engagements, day-to-day administrative matters and in post-default situations, we have established ourselves as a leading firm with committed experience in this area.

Our corporate trust lawyers have considerable experience representing financial institutions that serve in trustee and agency roles in domestic and global institutional debt offerings, including paying agent, registrar, account bank and depositary, escrow agent, calculation agent, exchange agent, conversion agent, and security trustee and collateral agent on secured bond transactions. Our experience encompasses all varieties of corporate debt, including high-yield debt, secured and unsecured, subordinate and convertible debt, PIK securities, TIA-qualified and privately placed, Rule 144A and Regulation S offerings, and cross-border (including multicurrency) transactions. Additionally, we advise on a variety of structured finance vehicles, including collateralized debt obligations, tax lien securitizations, mortgage-backed securities, and other forms of asset-backed securities. We closely monitor legislative and regulatory action taken and proposed that would impact the securitization markets.

We also advise our corporate trust clients in a wide variety of services related to the administration and securing of assets and cash flows (including UCC Article 8 and 9 issues, UCC filings, control agreements and other perfection matters, and opinions) associated with secured and unsecured loans, leveraged buy-outs and restructurings, cross-border transactions, and debtor-in-possession loans in Chapter 11 proceedings, in their role as administrative agent, collateral agent, DIP Agent, account bank, securities intermediary, custodian and escrow agent in syndicated loan and DIP facilities, and in domestic and international project and energy finance transactions.

An important part of our corporate trust practice also involves advising indenture trustees, issuers, lenders, issuers’ counsel, and investors in connection with indenture defaults and default administration, litigation, work-outs, and bankruptcies. Pillsbury corporate trust attorneys routinely represent the full range of corporate fiduciaries, with an emphasis on indenture trustees. Our experience includes representing corporate trustees in the enforcement and restructure of payment defaults and covenant violations (both in and out of Chapter 11 proceedings), inter-creditor priority disputes and related litigation, and post-default trust administration. We also advise corporate trustees in risk management, and in the unfortunate situation where a claim is asserted against an indenture trustee, we have extensive experience defending and litigating fiduciary duty claims asserted against indenture trustees.