The national law firm of Quarles & Brady LLP announced that James I. Kaplan has joined the firm’s Chicago office as a partner in the Corporate Services Practice Group.
“We are very excited to welcome Jim to Quarles & Brady,” said Kenneth V. Hallet, chairman of the firm’s Corporate Services Group. “Jim’s combination of a keen client-focused approach with exceptional substantive legal skills and experience make him a great addition to our team.”
“I am thrilled to be joining this outstanding firm, and I hope to do my part to build upon its already significant banking and financial services practice,” Kaplan said.
Prior to joining the firm, Kaplan was a partner and chairman of the Midwest Banking Practice at DLA Piper in Chicago. He has extensive experience in financial services regulatory matters, as well as banking, compliance, securities and shareholder disputes and other shareholder matters. His regulatory experience covers all major statutes and applicable regulations in the United States as well as other major foreign jurisdictions. Kaplan’s transactional experience includes banking, trust, securities, asset management, brokerage and public and private offerings. Kaplan is nationally recognized and well respected for his knowledge of legal matters touching modern financial institutions, basic and complex, large and small.
Kaplan has counseled senior management as well as numerous boards of directors and other governing bodies of companies on banking and financial services issues, including securities disclosure, corporate development and regulatory matters. He has been a banking and bank regulatory lawyer for more than 25 years and also specializes in merger and acquisition and private equity transactions involving banking and financial services companies.
Kaplan has also had a distinguished 17-year career as a senior managing in-house counsel with several organizations, including The Northern Trust Company and Cole Taylor Bank. Kaplan was also the founding General Counsel at Brown Brothers Harriman & Co., one of America’s oldest and largest private banks.
He received his law degree from the University of Chicago Law School and his undergraduate degree, magna cum laude, from Harvard College.
