Masahiro Ueno Nishimura & Asahi

Masahiro Ueno is a partner at Nishimura & Asahi. His areas of expertise are in securities, finance and banking law with an emphasis on structured finance. He has advised on numerous transactions relating to M&A finance, project finance, real estate finance, and securitization, including the first deals of those types in Japan. Additionally, his other area of expertise is in the resolution of financial disputes by way of out-of-court negotiation and settlement. Resolving disputes involving specialized and complicated financial transactions often requires profound knowledge and understanding of financial products (including derivatives, structuring techniques, regulatory aspects and so on) as well as market practices. There are very few court precedents dealing directly with such complicated disputes, so litigating these disputes in court would not always lead to an appropriate resolution. Rather, negotiating among the parties to the dispute and their counsel who is familiar with the financial transactions in dispute can facilitate a resolution which has due regard to the circumstances behind the transactions and which would be satisfactory to all the parties. Mr Ueno has handled various types of structured finance transactions and complicated regulatory matters, and has gained extensive experience in relation to those areas. He has sufficient knowledge to appropriately resolve financial disputes because of such experience. He has assisted many clients in resolving difficult financial disputes. In addition, he has advised on the restructuring of finance transactions that are facing difficulties and might otherwise go into default.

Mr Ueno graduated from the University of Tokyo in 1984 with an LLB and earned an LLM from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1991. He is admitted to practice in Japan and New York State. He has authored various articles on Japanese management buy-out transactions, project finance, and syndicated loans. Furthermore, as an international editor (Tokyo) for the Journal of Banking and Finance Law and Practice (an Australian journal), he has written a number of pieces on the development of Japan's finance-related law.

Nishimura & Asahi has played an important role in the development of structured finance from even before its formative stage in Japan until the present day. For example, the firm engages in securitization in all asset classes, fields and structural features. The firm also deals with real estate finance, which includes the formation of real estate funds, REITs and nonrecourse loans, and issuances of commercial mortgage backed securities. The firm advises on creating deal structures, solving legal issues, negotiating with various parties and regulatory authorities in Japan and overseas, and preparing and drafting many varieties of documents from contracts to regulatory documents with the aim of devising the market standard, and is actively contributing to the development of securitization and other structured finance transactions.