As the financial crisis spread wider and wider in 2008, H. Rodgin Cohen got more and more work.
For all of this, The American Lawyer magazine has named Cohen, the chairman of the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell, the No. 1 dealmaker of 2008.
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By the magazine’s count, Cohen took part in at least 17 “global credit crisis-related mergers, bailouts and cash infusions” during the year.
Cohen was a key player in the sale of Bear Stearns to JPMorgan Chase, and he represented Fannie Mae in its takeover talks with the U.S. government.
He advised Lehman Brothers Holdings during its bankruptcy, just as he counseled Barclays Bank when it acquired some of Lehman Brothers.
Cohen was there for Wachovia Corporation when it was sold to Wells Fargo, and he helped Goldman Sachs become a bank holding company.
Why did Cohen get all this work?
“He probably has the most impressive reputation in terms of banking and work with Treasury and the Fed of any lawyer out there,” Stephen Ashley, former chairman of the Fannie Mae board of directors, told The American Lawyer.
“It’s like going to see a surgeon,” said Robert Steel, the former chief executive of Wachovia. “You want a surgeon who has seen a lot of these operations.”
Cohen suggested to the magazine that he’ll have plenty of work as 2009 goes on, as well.
He didn’t think the Troubled Asset Relief Program was well packaged, though he did express faith in President Obama and Timothy Geithner, the treasury secretary.
A native of West Virginia and a graduate of Harvard Law School, Cohen, 64, has worked with troubled banks for more than 30 years. In 1980, he was also involved in the resolution of the Iran hostage crisis.
In March, Cohen reportedly withdrew his name from consideration to be deputy treasury secretary.
The American Lawyer’s No. 2 dealmaker for 2008 was Edward Herlihy, a lawyer with Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, outside counsel for Bank of America. Herlihy advised the bank in its merger with Merrill Lynch & Co.
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