Hogan Lovells announced today that an international team of its lawyers advised on a US$1.5 billion oil-backed prepayment financing between its client Petroleos de Venezuela and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Limited (ICBC). The financing closed on 27 February following two months of collaboration among a team of Hogan Lovells lawyers in Beijing, Caracas, London, and Washington, D.C.

Sidley Austin LLP is pleased to announce that Stephen Blackshaw is joining the firm’s London office as a partner. Mr. Blackshaw focuses on mergers and acquisitions, securities offerings and other general corporate work, including restructuring and insolvencies.

Sidley Austin LLP is pleased to announce that Timothy J. Moran will join the firm as a partner in the project finance practice in Washington, D.C. Mr. Moran’s practice focuses on infrastructure project development and finance, where he represents lenders, project sponsors and developers in the development, financing, acquisition and sale of infrastructure projects located in North America, Central and South America, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Mr. Moran’s projects include alternative energy (wind, solar and biomass), coal and natural gas-fired facilities, natural gas storage facilities, LNG projects and natural gas pipelines.

Davis Polk advised J.P. Morgan Securities LLC, Citigroup Global Markets Inc. and Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated as joint book-running managers of a $3 billion SEC-registered offering by ArcelorMittal consisting of $500 million aggregate principal amount of 3.75% notes due 2015, $1.4 billion aggregate principal amount of 4.5% notes due 2017 and $1.1 billion aggregate principal amount of 6.25% notes due 2022.

Dr. Axel Schilder, a prominent German tax lawyer and former official of the German tax authority, joined King & Spalding as a partner in its Frankfurt am Main, Germany, office, the firm announced today. Schilder will help build up the German arm of the firm’s tax practice with a focus on real estate and investment tax law, support the continued growth of the firm’s capital transactions and real estate practice in Frankfurt and strengthen the taxation expertise of the firm’s and office’s fund structuring and international transactional work. Schilder joined King & Spalding today from the law firm of Beiten Burkhardt Rechtsanwaltsgesellschaft mbH, where he was a partner.

Chadbourne & Parke represented a consortium including Macquarie Mexican Infrastructure Fund (“MMIF”) on the development and financing of a 396MW wind farm in the State of Oaxaca, Mexico. This project is the largest single stage wind farm in Latin America.