These days, most people describe the energy in Orrick’s London offices as being somewhere between focused and slightly frenzied—in the best possible sense. The firm opened a new US office in Charlotte, hired 42 attorneys from a single rival since September 2025, and just last week added two more structured finance partners from Cadwalader to a London team that looked nothing like this eighteen months ago. In legal circles, where major decisions are typically made cautiously and slowly, this type of expansion tends to draw criticism. It appears that Orrick has concluded that being cautious is a luxury that isn’t really possible right now.
Asset-backed securitization, or ABS for short, is the driving force behind all of this. This area of finance spent a number of years bearing the reputational burden of the 2008 financial crisis before discreetly rehabilitating itself into one of the more active and truly helpful sectors of the debt markets. The fundamental process hasn’t changed much: pools of assets that generate income, such as mortgages, auto loans, credit card balances, and solar financing agreements, are bundled into tradeable securities to provide investors with a structured exposure to those cash flows and to allow originators to free up capital.
| Topic Overview: Orrick’s London Expansion & the ABS Market Revival | Details |
|---|---|
| Firm | Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP — global law firm aggressively expanding its structured finance practice in London and the US |
| Latest Hires | Suzanne Bell (Chambers & Legal 500 ranked ABS partner) and William Bibby (Chambers Rising Star) — both from Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft |
| Total Cadwalader Lawyers Hired | 42 lawyers poached since September 2025, including 10 partners across London and the US |
| Initial Raid | September 2025 — 37-lawyer transatlantic CLO and asset-backed lending team, opening a new Orrick office in Charlotte, North Carolina |
| CLO Market Ranking | Ranked No. 3 global CLO arranger counsel by volume for 2025 in both Europe and the US (Octus); No. 2 most active arranger counsel in Q1 2026 globally |
| Global ABS Market Size | $7.30 trillion in 2026 — projected to reach $12.55 trillion by 2035 |
| Key Growth Areas | Consumer loans, residential mortgages, solar loans, credit cards, NAV credit facilities, private credit CLOs |
| European Private Credit CLOs | London team advised on four European private credit CLOs in Q1 2026 alone — a fast-growing segment |
| Cadwalader Context | Cadwalader is merging with Hogan Lovells from July 1, 2026 — adding organizational uncertainty behind the departures |
| Broader Market Signal | Private credit CLO market grew 19% in the US last year; European market now beginning to follow |
Who is doing it, what assets are entering, and the amount of money moving through the entire ecosystem have all changed. By 2035, the global ABS market is expected to have nearly doubled from its 2026 valuation of about $7.3 trillion. A niche recovery is not what that is. It is an expansion of the structure.
Suzanne Bell, the attorney Orrick most recently hired, worked at Cadwalader for over thirteen years, developing a practice that encompassed both conventional securitization and the more intricate realm of esoteric cross-border transactions, such as NAV credit facilities, a product type that has attracted special attention as private credit funds seek to borrow against the unrealized value of their portfolios.
As alternative lenders search for funding models that don’t rely on traditional banking relationships, her colleague William Bibby, who moved up from special counsel to partner, brings specialized expertise in residential mortgage and consumer finance warehouse transactions—exactly the bread-and-butter structures seeing renewed volume. The point is that they work together to fill certain gaps in Orrick’s London capability. This is not a haphazard hiring process. It reads like a methodical checklist that is being carefully completed.
It’s important to comprehend the larger context of these actions. In addition to losing all of these employees, Cadwalader is undergoing a significant transition of its own, merging with Hogan Lovells on July 1. As a result, partners are naturally uncertain about their options. Whether on purpose or by coincidence, Orrick has been in a position to spot talent in action. However, pull factors are just as important as push factors. Because of Orrick’s deal flow, structured finance attorneys are relocating there. In the first quarter of 2026, the firm was the second most active arranger counsel for CLO transactions worldwide. During that same three-month period, its London team closed four European private credit CLOs. That kind of activity is more important than most other factors for practitioners in this field. Attorneys adhere to the work.
Since a large portion of the new energy in structured finance is actually concentrated in the private credit CLO segment, it merits special attention. These CLOs are backed by loans that were directly created by private credit funds rather than by widely syndicated loans, which are the conventional raw material. There is a need for attorneys who are familiar with both the structural complexity and the regulatory environment on this side of the Atlantic, as the US market for this product grew 19% last year and the European version is beginning to follow a similar trajectory. As those transactions grow, Orrick’s London team, which is now much bigger and more specialized than it was a year ago, is positioning itself to be there.
It’s difficult to look at all of this without thinking that Orrick is placing a calculated wager that the structured finance cycle has actually turned, that the years of cautious activity and modest volume that followed the financial crisis have given way to something more sustained. Although there are risks associated with the buildout’s speed, that wager is most likely correct.
Regardless of how well the early deal flow metrics appear, integrating 42 lawyers from one culture into another is not an easy operational task. The integration “exceeded expectations by every measure,” according to Leah Sanzari, head of Orrick’s global structured finance group. This kind of statement is meant to convey confidence. It’s still unclear if it will continue to grow at this rate. However, the direction appears to be well-established.
