The Financial Institutions Practice Group has the extensive experience and skill to provide professional, efficient, and cost-effective legal services to clients of all sizes, no matter how simple or complex the issues. We currently represent a large number of community and midsize banks and their holding companies, as well as larger regional multistate banks and holding companies, in North Carolina and other states. We represent our clients before state and federal banking and securities regulatory agencies.
The broad experience and varied backgrounds of the attorneys in the group give us the ability to provide a broad range of services to our financial institutions clients. While the types of services we regularly provide vary from client to client, our full range of services is available to all of our clients.
Some of the services we provide include handling acquisitions of other financial institutions and purchases and sales of branch offices; reorganizing bank holding companies; designing and implementing stock option plans and other stock-based, incentive, or deferred compensation plans for officers, directors, and employees; handling matters relating to capital structure, including stock splits, stock dividends, and compliance with regulatory capital requirements; drawing up charter and bylaw amendments; and handling offers of equity, debt and preferred trust securities, and other capital formation transactions.
Other services we provide include assisting with annual and special meetings of shareholders, including handling the proxy solicitation process, preparing and filing proxy statements, and conducting and documenting shareholder meetings; structuring boards of directors and advising on the duties and responsibilities of corporate directors and officers; advising on compliance with state and federal securities regulations, including reporting requirements applicable to stock ownership and transfers by insiders and other periodic reporting; structuring non-deposit financial services, including security brokerage, "sweep" accounts, repurchase agreements, trust services, insurance sales, mortgage brokerage, and other such financial services; and interpreting state and federal banking and other regulations and advising on compliance.
In addition, we assist our clients in preparing various regulatory applications; assist with consumer lending forms and regulations; and handle bank operations matters, including the deposit and check collection process and related disputes.
Attorneys in the Financial Institutions Practice Group—one of whom is listed in The Best Lawyers in America and in "Legal Elite," a list by Business North Carolina of the 200 best attorneys in the state—offer to provide more services as our clients need them. In addition, as issues arise that are pertinent to our clients, the group prepares and sends out special bulletins to clients.
The attorneys in the Financial Institutions Practice Group frequently draw upon the skills and experience of attorneys in other groups. This allows us to assist our clients with a variety of other legal matters. For example, our Creditors' Rights Practice Group deals with debtor-creditor matters such as bankruptcies, foreclosures, lender liability issues, loan workouts, and collections. Our Labor and Employment Practice Group handles matters such as designing and implementing employment policies and procedures, preparing employment agreements, handling government agency investigations and audits, litigating wrongful termination cases, and handling affirmative action, wage and hour, and discrimination issues and complaints. Our Real Estate and Environmental Practice Groups handle real property and environmental matters. Our Construction Practice Group deals with general contract matters such as purchase and service contracts, construction agreements, and other miscellaneous business transactions. Our Intellectual Property Practice Group handles all kinds of intellectual property matters, including trademarks and computer software contracts. In addition, our Litigation and Tax Practice Groups take care of lawsuits and a broad range of tax matters.
Attorneys in the Financial Institutions Practice Group bring to their work a range of complementary experience including the following: vice president and general counsel-corporate secretary for a bank holding company in North Carolina; bank examiner for the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation; related financial services counsel for a bank holding company in North Carolina; and chairman of a research foundation in North Carolina and member of a state legal commission.
