Covington & Burling has hired a leveraged finance partner from rival US law firm Paul Hastings in London.
Adrian Chiodo is joining Covington’s City office as head of European leveraged finance, a spokesperson for the Washington, DC, headquartered law firm confirmed to Financial News.
His hire follows the addition of private equity M&A partner Mark Thompson from Weil Gotshal & Manges in 2022.
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Thompson, who is co-chair of the firm’s global private equity practice, told FN that Chiodo’s addition would help serve the firm’s financial sponsor clients in London.
“We’re really excited to have Adrian join us. It gives us some heft in the leveraged finance area. We can pursue the kinds of transactions that our sponsor clients are looking to do in 2024,” he said.
“Covington is a great firm, great opportunity and it has a number of differentiators for private equity and leveraged finance practices and that’s what’s drawn me,” Chiodo said.
Chiodo joined Paul Hastings in 2021. He previously spent nearly a decade at Latham & Watkins. He has also worked at Gilbert + Tobin, Milbank and trained at Allens Arthur Robinson.
Other recent hires for Covington in London include David Berman, who joined the firm in October last year to lead its Emea financial services practice.
Recent exits from Paul Hastings in London include restructuring partner David Ereira who left the firm last month to join Quinn Emanuel.
Other leveraged finance partners who have left the firm include Richard Kitchen and Amin Doulai, who departed to King & Spalding in August 2022.
Paul Hastings made a major lender-side leveraged finance push in London in 2022 with the addition of a 15-lawyer team from Latham & Watkins led by partners Ross Anderson, Mo Nurmohamed, Karan Chopra, and Rob Davidson.
Other recent hires for Paul Hastings in London include William Needham who joined the firm late last year from private equity firm KKR to co-chair its European restructuring practice.
Last month, the firm bumped pay for new lawyers in London to £173,000.
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