Evgeny Zelensky
Evgeny is a US-qualified lawyer and the head of our capital markets practice in Russia. He has been working on capital markets transactions since the late 1990s and has established a reputation as a leading Russian capital markets lawyer. He has advised on domestic and international equity and debt offerings by issuers in Russia and the CIS (including more than 40 IPOs and secondary offerings) as well as on liability management, consent solicitations, tender offers and restructuring of defaulted bonds. He also has considerable experience in derivatives and structured products, M&A and securities regulation.
Evgeny holds a Juris Doctor from Notre Dame Law School in the United States. Before joining the firm as partner in 2008, he was Executive Director and Co-Head of Legal and Compliance at Renaissance Capital, a leading emerging markets investment bank, and prior to that he worked in the New York and Moscow offices of another international law firm.
Credentials
- VTB Capital on a US$556.7 million follow-on offering of DIXI Group, a Russian retail company, listed on the Russian RTS and MICEX exchanges
- Alfa-Bank on two issues of loan participation notes (LPN) of US$1 billion each listed on the London Stock Exchange's Regulated Market – the largest ever bond issues by a privately-owned Russian bank
- Vnesheconombank (VEB) on the issue of its Swiss Francs 500 million LPNs, and associated swap agreement, issued under VEB's US$30 billion LPN programme. The notes are listed on the Swiss Stock Exchange
- The Republic of Belarus on the public placement and public circulation of sovereign bonds of the Republic of Belarus in Russia - the first ever public placement of rouble-denominated bonds of a foreign sovereign issuer on a Russian stock exchange
- ONEXIM Group on an over US$400 million debt and corporate restructuring of RBC Group, a Russian media company, including the restructuring of RBC's distressed debts by way of exchange of existing debts into newly issued LPNs, warrants, domestic Russian bonds, options and cash payments
- Da Vinci Capital, Och-Ziff, Insight Partners, Spinnaker and Alpha Associates (minority shareholders of RTS) on the merger of RTS and MICEX and the sale of stake in RTS to MICEX
- Troika Dialog on the US$300 million sale of 36% of its shares to Standard Bank for a consideration involving a US$200 million convertible loan and 100% of shares of Standard Bank's Russian subsidiary ZAO Standard Bank
- Sberbank, Russia's largest bank, on the formation of a credit history bureau jointly with Experian, global credit bureau operator, and Interfax group and on the acquisition of a 50% stake in the bureau by Sberbank
“Evgeny Zelensky ‘is a widely admired character, particularly on the equity side’”
Chambers Global 2011
“Evgeny Zelensky is commended for his ‘creativity’ and skills as a ‘team leader’”
European Legal 500 2011
“Very friendly and always reliable”
IFLR1000 2011
“He has a good team working for him, and he always does what you ask of him”
IFLR1000 2011
“Workaholic” and “hugely experienced”
European Legal 500 2011
“Evgeny Zelensky has ‘amazing technical expertise’”
Chambers Global 2010
The Guide to the World's Leading Capital Markets Lawyers consistently names Evgeny Zelensky one of the best lawyers advising on capital markets law in Russia