Profile: B Robbins Kiessling

Banking

Biography: Banking

B Robbins Kiessling is a partner in the Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP corporate department and is the firm's banking practice head. Rob's practice encompasses a broad range of finance, banking, financial institution and related matters, including syndicated bank financings, leveraged finance, capital markets transactions, and mergers and acquisitions. Rob's clients have included JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Bank of America and other commercial and investment banks.

Rob has represented arrangers and lenders in many of the most notable leveraged bank financings, including acquisition financings for Allied Waste, Invista, Dex Media, SunGard Data Systems and Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold; the financing for Verizon's spin-off of Idearc; an asset based restructuring facility for Rite Aid; and numerous media and telecoms credits. Rob has also regularly represented lenders in acquisition and other financings for professional sports franchises, including facilities for the Houston Texans, Minnesota Vikings, San Francisco Giants, Texas Rangers, Oakland Athletics, New Jersey Nets, Cleveland Indians and the recent league-wide credit facility for members of the National Basketball Association.

In his mergers and acquisitions practice, Rob has represented State Street Corporation in its acquisition of Investors Financial Services, DE Shaw; Perry Capital and other hedge fund investors in acquiring a majority equity interest in Doral Financial Corporation; Banco Santander in acquiring, as a member of a three-bank consortium, ABN Amro; JPMorgan Chase in its acquisition of Texas Commerce Bankshares and its merger with Manufacturers Hanover; Salomon Brothers in its acquisition by Citigroup; and US Trust in its acquisition by Charles Schwab.