Biography: Capital Markets

Mr Oakes is a partner in Davis Polk's corporate department, resident in the London office. He is head of our European financial institutions group practice. Mr Oakes represents European companies and investment banks in securities offerings and other financings in the international public and private markets. He has extensive experience in advising non-US companies on initial public offerings of equity and high-yield debt securities and offerings of investment-grade debt securities. Mr Oakes also advises clients on various aspects of mergers and acquisitions and all aspects of compliance with US securities regulation. He concentrates in securities offerings by financial institutions.

Since the mid-1990s, Mr Oakes has advised on equity, debt and structured finance transactions for many financial institutions, including AEGON, Allianz, AXA, Delta Lloyd, Istituto Nazionale delle Assicurazioni, Fortis Group, ING Group, SEB, UBS and Zurich Financial Services. He has regularly advised such investment banks as Citi, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America Merrill Lynch and UBS in capital markets transactions. He advised Standard Life plc and Old Mutual, the South African insurer, on their demutualisations, London Stock Exchange listings and concurrent international equity offerings.

Recent transactions include advising the underwriters on the: £276 million initial public offering of Jupiter Fund Management plc; the €7.5 billion rights offering for ING; the €1.1 billion initial public offering of common stock of Delta Lloyd NV; the €1 billion common stock offering for Aegon NV; the SEK 15 billion rights offering for SEB and the CHF 16 billion rights offer for UBS; and the $1.6 billion senior note/lower Tier 2 debt offering and $691 million GDR offering by Commercial Bank of Qatar. He is currently advising Resolution Limited, the UK public vehicle advised by Clive Cowdery, in its £2,055 million rights offer to finance the acquisition of substantially all of AXA's UK life insurance business; 3i Group, a UK private equity firm, on its £732 million ($1.1 billion) rights offering; Her Majesty's government on certain US aspects of their schemes to provide financial support to the U.K. banking system; and Standard Life on its demutualisation and flotation.

Mr Oakes is listed as a leading lawyer in several legal industry publications, including: Chambers Global: The World's Leading Lawyers for Business; Chambers Europe; Chambers UK; Practical Law Company's Cross-border Capital Markets Handbook; Legal Media Group's Expert Guide to the World's Leading Capital Markets Lawyers; and Law Business Research's The International Who's Who of Capital Markets Lawyers.

Mr Oakes received his AB from Princeton University in 1975 and his JD (magna cum lauded) from University of Miami School of Law in 1979. He is a member of the American Bar Association, and became a partner of the firm in 1998. He is admitted to the State of New York.