Mayer Brown partner Adam Wolk named a 2021 “Northeast Trailblazer” by The American Lawyer

Mayer Brown announced that New York-based Banking & Finance partner Adam Wolk has been named to The American Lawyer’s inaugural list of “Northeast Trailblazers,” which recognizes professionals in the region who are agents of change and have made a significant impact in the legal industry. (View Profile.)

Mr. Wolk focuses his practice on leveraged finance and has worked on high-profile and innovative banking and finance matters for more than a decade. Recently, he advised clients through a number of pandemic-related issues, including liquidity transactions and covenant relief under existing financing arrangements, as well as LIBOR transition issues.

Notably, Mr. Wolk co-led a team that enabled United Airlines to raise $6.8 billion of much-needed cash in a pioneering transaction that melds concepts from corporate loan, bond and structured finance products. The transaction was extremely successful, ultimately executed as a hybrid bank/bond issuance with structured finance features, attracting immense interest from investors in various products including securitization, high yield bonds and leveraged loans.

The structure, which the Mayer Brown team helped devise, protects lenders and bondholders in a downside scenario while unlocking a key asset for use in a structure that proved attractive to investors during the height of pandemic-induced uncertainty in the debt markets. Other airlines have obtained financing using a similar structure that follows the model that the Mayer Brown team helped pioneer, while companies in other industries consider similar structures to leverage loyalty programs and similar assets, The American Lawyer noted in his profile.