Capital Markets

Overview

From obtaining or maintaining your listing to seeking or providing financing, you need advice you can rely on from seasoned lawyers who've been through the process and know how to make it work.

At Gowling WLG, we have vast experience in fundraising ventures and acting for capital markets participants, and take great pride in what we help our clients achieve.

Recognised as one of the most active and successful in equity raisings and stock exchange listings, we know that your business is unique - which is why we take the time to fully understand your objectives. We also know that cost control, increased predictability and risk avoidance are critical to your success.

That's why we apply a budget-conscious approach to your deals by implementing efficient fee arrangements, offering optimised rates and anticipating risks and costs to ensure you get the most value from your legal spend.

We also offer customised tools to support your success. This includes applying our innovative project management approach, Practical LPM™, to seamlessly manage the scope, costs, tasks and resources associated with your file to help keep your legal matter on track, on time and on budget.

Our services include strategic legal advice on:

  • Debt and equity transactions
  • Corporate finance transactions, including private placements, public offerings, bought deals, alternative financings and cross-border financings
  • Stock exchange listings, including dual-listings with foreign exchanges
  • Capital restructurings
  • Global deposit receipt (GDR) programmes
  • Due diligence
  • Representation before securities regulators and stock exchanges
  • Stakeholder activism

We counsel publicly traded and private companies, including their boards and special committees, investors, financial advisers, agents and underwriters. We provide advice on compliance with securities regulatory and stock exchange requirements. We will proactively inform you of emerging trends in disclosure obligations, corporate governance and directors' duties.

Our team also advises general partners, fund sponsors, fund investors, pension funds and other pools of capital on all aspects of the establishment and restructuring of investments into various types of funds.

We're particularly noted for our extensive international experience, having handled financing transactions on behalf of companies operating in numerous jurisdictions across Europe, Asia, the Americas, Africa and Australasia.

In working with Gowling WLG, you'll receive personalised service from leading capital markets professionals who have a genuine interest in your business and its success. Please get in touch with any member of our group to find out how we can help you.

Canada

Whether you're obtaining or maintaining your listing, looking for financing or providing it, you need legal advice you can rely on from seasoned lawyers who've been through the process and know how to make it work.

At Gowling WLG, we have vast experience in fundraising ventures and acting for capital markets participants in Canada and around the world, and take great pride in what we help our clients achieve.

We know that your business is unique, and we take the time to fully understand your objectives. We also know that cost control, increased predictability and risk avoidance are critical to success. That's why we apply a budget-conscious approach to your deals by implementing efficient fee arrangements, offering optimized rates and anticipating risks and costs to ensure you get the most value from your legal spend.

We also offer customised tools to support your success. This includes applying our innovative project management approach, Practical LPM™, to seamlessly manage the scope, costs, tasks and resources associated with your file to help keep your matter on track, on time and on budget.

Our capital markets services include practical, strategic legal advice on:

  • Debt and equity transactions
  • Public offerings, including bought deals and secondary offerings
  • Other corporate finance transactions, including private placements, alternative financings and cross-border financings
  • Stock exchange listings, including dual-listings with foreign exchanges
  • Creation of capital pool companies (CPCs) and related qualifying transactions
  • Capital restructurings
  • Due diligence
  • Representation before securities regulators and stock exchanges
  • Stakeholder activism

We counsel publicly traded and private companies, including their boards and special committees, investors, financial advisers, agents and underwriters.

We provide advice on compliance with securities regulatory and stock exchange requirements, and will proactively inform you of emerging trends in disclosure obligations, corporate governance and directors' duties. We're on top of - and heavily involved in - capital markets regulatory developments in Canada.

Our team is particularly noted for its extensive international experience, having handled financing transactions on behalf of companies operating in numerous jurisdictions across Europe, Asia, the Americas, Africa and Australasia.

Learn more

In working with us, you'll receive personalized service from a team of leading professionals with a genuine interest in your business and its success. Please get in touch with any member of our group to find out how we can help you. You can also stay up to date on the latest legal developments in capital markets by subscribing to our free MarketCaps newsletter. Subscribe to our updates.

UK

Capital markets transactions can be a key development in how a public company operates and raises new capital for growth; in-depth legal knowledge and experience of the capital markets are vital components in managing your requirements in going public and securing future funding and getting this transformation right. Our long-established capital markets law firm has an extensive track record advising issuers and their sponsors, financial advisers, nominated advisers and brokers on IPOs and secondary fundraises. Always considering key commercial issues important to our clients, we are well versed in navigating potential issues in any transaction.

We rank among the top-tier law firms for total number of stock market clients (Main Market and AIM), and have consistently been ranked as a leading AIM market adviser, both by a number of clients and market capitalisation, (Advisers Rankings Guide). We are particularly noted for our international experience and our comprehensive capital markets offering.

Our team of capital markets lawyers is recognised as one of the most active and successful in stock exchange and equity transactions, having vast experience advising issuers, sponsors, brokers and nomads on IPOs on the Main Market (Premium and Standard listing segments), AIM and AQSE. We have also advised numerous clients on migrations from, or dual listings, on the Toronto Stock Exchange, the TSX Venture Exchange, the Canadian Securities Exchange and the Australian Securities Exchange.

Our Equity Capital Markets team has an established track record. We acted on the first AIM IPO 25 years ago, have acted on over 450 AIM deals, with total funds raised being over £7 billion, and currently act for over 86 Main Market and AIM listed companies. Since 2015, we have been involved in more Main Market IPOs than any other law firm.

We handle transactions on behalf of companies operating in over 60 jurisdictions, in addition to the UK, with particular experience in North and South America, Australia, South-East Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and India.

Capital markets services

Client work

We were thrilled to have Gowling WLG by our side on this deal. The team's M&A and capital markets experience is extremely valuable to us.Frank Sagnier, CEO of Codemasters Group

Awards and recognition

The legal directories consistently recognise us for our work in the market, with The Legal 500 ranking our team in Tier 1 for Listed Funds and Tier 2 for Equity Capital Markets: Small Mid-cap. Chambers UK also rank the team in Band 2 for Capital Markets: AIM and Investment Funds: Closed-ended Listed Funds. We were pleased to rank 1st, 2nd or 3rd for the AIM market in every quarter in the Advisers Ranking Guide 2021.

In a crowded marketplace, industry insight can be key to completing a deal. Our Annual Nomad Conference is recognised as the premier event for nominated advisers. We also produce an AIM Handbook each year, which is coveted by Nomads for companies considering a listing on AIM. Likewise, our strong presence in the investment funds sector means we can offer a comprehensive advisory service to clients, based on a deep knowledge of market norms and practice.

Contact our team

For further advice on how we can help you with your capital markets transactions, contact a member of our team today.

Charles Bond
Partner, Head of Capital Markets and Natural Resources (UK)

Hugh Maule
Partner

David Brennan
Partner, Co-Chair of Global Tech

Samantha Myers
Partner, Head of UK Cannabis Group

Jeffrey Elway
Partner

Sunil Kakkad
Consultant

Andrew Wright
Consultant