4 Asian Legal Business | November 2024 The Briefs infrastructure-focused lawyers to advise on taking advantage of the law’s tax credits and other provisions. Although Trump has criticized the law, it would take Congress to repeal it. That would be unlikely given the clean energy investments the IRA has generated in Republican states. The first Trump administration led to a drop in federal environmental enforcement, but an uptick in state enforcement and a robust pipeline of private environmental lawsuits, corporate environmental lawyers have said. Several major law firms, such as Kirkland & Ellis, DLA Piper and Covington & Burling, created environmental, social and governance (ESG) practices in recent years, focused on new reporting requirements and investor activism on issues such as climate change and employee and management diversity. Trump and his Republican allies are likely to energize an existing backlash against the ESG movement that could bring new work to such firms. Mergers and acquisitions Bankers, lawyers and consultants said in interviews with Reuters that M&A activity, which reached a record high in 2021, could slow under a Trump administration due to policy uncertainty, trade wars, protectionism and inflationary pressures. But investment bankers and deal lawyers also said Trump’s agenda would ease constraints they faced under Biden, whose administration adopted a tough stance on antitrust policy and challenged several significant transactions. Clients may take advantage of looser merger enforcement to push forward with large-cap company deals, said Zeughauser, noting that M&A work reverberates through many law firm practices including regulatory, employment, litigation, private equity and real estate. Antitrust Trump is expected to dial back some Biden-era antitrust priorities and potentially abandon a bid to break up Alphabet’s Google over its online search dominance, experts told Reuters. He will likely press other cases targeting Big Tech, however, and few expect drastically curtailed antitrust enforcement. Trump is also likely to pull back on some policies that irritated dealmakers under the Biden administration and Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan, attorneys said, including a reluctance to settle with merging companies facing enforcement actions by the FTC or the Department of Justice. Binstock said antitrust work at law firms could increase if Trump’s policies spark more dealmaking, but the impact could be tempered by laxer enforcement. Employment and immigration Trump made cracking down on illegal immigration a campaign centerpiece and called for reforming aspects of legal immigration. The latter could spur work for lawyers who help corporate clients manage cross-border deals, overseas employees and foreign-born U.S. workers. Trump is expected to undo rule changes by the National Labor Relations Board under Biden and replace key NLRB personnel, giving employers a greater advantage in labor matters, employment law firm Fisher Phillips noted on its website. International trade International trade practices can expect to be busy if Trump achieves some of his promised initiatives, said Rachel Nonaka, a partner at legal recruiting firm Macrae. Trump has proposed 10 percent or higher tariffs on all U.S. imports, a move he says would eliminate the trade deficit. Critics say it would lead to higher U.S. prices and global economic instability. Major U.S. law firms have already adjusted their approach to a key trade rival, China, with a growing number shuttering their offices in that country. Beyond specific practice areas, large law firms can expect to maintain healthy financial performances after a strong 2024, law firm strategist Kristin Stark of Fairfax Associates said in an email. “Thus far, we do not see a change in the administration/White House impacting that trajectory, and fortunately, we have likely averted disruption that would have come from a contested election,” Stark said. In the news 1 Nagashima Ohno & Tsunematsu plans to open its first European office in London in January 2025. The firm has appointed Kiyoshi Honda as the representative and expanded its European Practice Group to strengthen its international presence. 2 U.S. firm Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel and Herbert Smith Freehills plan to merge, creating a firm with over 2,700 lawyers and $2 billion in combined revenues. The merged entity would operate globally as Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer and as HSF Kramer in the United States. 3 Singapore has introduced a bill to establish an International Committee within the Singapore International Commercial Court to handle civil appeals from specific foreign jurisdictions. The committee will include judges from Singapore’s Supreme Court, international judges, and ad hoc members from foreign courts.
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