Latham Advises on Environmental Finance Awards’ Impact Initiative of the Year and ESG Innovation of the Year

Latham & Watkins advised on two winning transactions in the Environmental Finance Sustainable Investment Awards 2020:

• Impact Initiative of the Year Latham advised one of the IIFC funds managed by Newmarket Capital on Jupiter, a US$3.4 billion credit risk transfer featuring ground-breaking impact characteristics including pricing incentives linked to positive impact and capital redeployment requirements. The transaction governed by French law comprises more than 250 loans in about 40 countries. Under the terms of the Jupiter credit risk transfer, Société Générale has committed to dedicate 25% of the risk-weighted asset reduction achieved with the credit risk transfer to spur new ‘positive impact financing’ over the next three years. Latham’s team was led by Paris counsel Suzana Sava-Montanari with London partner Sanjev Warna-kula-suriya, Paris tax partner Olivia Rauch-Ravisé and associates Jamie Hall and Alexis Caminel. 
• ESG Innovation of the Year (funds and portfolios) Latham represented one of the IIFC funds managed by Newmarket Capital on the issuance of two cash securitisations of Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC)-eligible loans made by Citi Community Capital, an arm of Citibank that finances for-profit and not-for-profit affordable housing developers in the US. It is an innovative model that other banks could use to increase lending headroom in the affordable housing space. Latham’s team was led by New York partner Loren Finegold and Paris counsel Suzana Sava-Montanari with Los Angeles Counsel Anna Rienhardt and a team of associates. The deal also won Most Innovative Securitization Deal of the Year at GlobalCapital’s US Securitization Award.
  

Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) factors are increasingly being used by fund managers and organisations to select and maximise the performance of their investments. The 2020 Sustainable Investment Awards seek to recognise asset managers, analysts and data providers incorporating ESG across all asset classes – fixed income, listed and private equity, debt funds, multi asset funds, infrastructure funds and fund of funds.