Skip to content

Michaela Walker

Partner
Product Group Head, European Head Financial Services Sector

Michaela is a financial services lawyer and advises fund managers on the establishment of authorized funds and advises a broad range of financial institutions. 

These include asset managers, depositaries and custodians on financial services regulation, including AIFMD, UCITS, MiFID and in relation to ESG and sustainability.

Michaela is the Product Group Head of the Eversheds Sutherland financial services team and heads the Financial Services sector in Europe. She has advised financial institutions on a wide range of financial services issues since she qualified in 1994.

She has more than 25 years’ experience of advising leading asset managers, depositaries, custodians, administrators and other service providers, charities, pension schemes and other financial institutions on regulatory and product-related work.

She regularly advises clients in the structuring and establishment of investment funds — both onshore and offshore — and regarding issues arising in the life cycle of a fund, including mergers, changes to investment strategy and service providers.

Michaela advises on all contracts relevant to fund establishment, including depositary agreements, investment management agreements and custody arrangements. She also advises on all aspects of distribution of funds, including passporting, distribution agreements, and private placement regimes and relevant disclosure documents.

Her practice includes advising on the various relevant regulatory changes, including UCITS and AIFMD, MiFID, PRIIPs and Brexit, and the impact of ESG and sustainability factors on funds and fund managers.

In her spare time Michaela enjoys travel, cooking, improving her French language skills and reading.

Michaela has acted on a wide range of financial services transactions for a wide variety of financial services providers, including:

  • advising a major provider of depositary services over a two-year project to transition their trustee and depositary business from a branch of an EU bank to a UK established entity. The project involved repapering of over 500 contracts and other documents for 19 clients, engaging with the regulator in the UK and in 10 other jurisdictions as well as regulatory advice and advice on required permissions
  • helping to establish a "host" fund manager in the UK from inception and subsequently selling the business to a third party. The work involved establishing the legal and liability framework for the client, as well as onboarding 12 different new clients over the lifetime of the host and negotiating and agreeing contracts and fund documentation
  • advising clients on the formation of funds with ESG or sustainability objectives, including consideration of the relevant regulatory requirements and disclosure obligations
  • advising 5 depositaries on their implementation of UCITS V and AIFMD, including regulatory advice and preparation of compliant depositary agreement templates
  • advising a large outsourcing provider on the regulatory aspects of outsourcing custody, depositary and fund administration services to a leading asset manager
  • advising a leading asset manager on the review and remediation of its fund documentation across its range of unit trusts and OEICs in response to FCA scrutiny of the investment objectives and policies
  • advising a leading asset manager on the consolidation of its fund range with a fund range acquired from another fund manager following an acquisition of another fund management business
  • helping an asset manager revamp its charging structure across its fund range as a consequence of the asset management market study
  • advising an ACD on the transfer of its fund range to a "host" ACD 
  • Regularly presents at public and client conferences and events
  • Is regularly quoted in the press, including FT Ignites
  • Has written commentary on the Collective Investment Sourcebook for The Butterworth Collective
  • Has contributed to chapters in various financial services publications
  • Product Group head of the Team Ranked in Band 1 for open-ended investment funds in Chambers and The Legal 500
  • Ranked as a Band 1 lawyer in Chambers for open-ended investment funds
  • Ranked in Chambers UK 2018, 2019
  • Heavily involved with industry developments and has inputted into various government and regulator consultations
  • Regularly sits on working groups with the Investment Association (including recently in relation to the Offshore Funds Regime), The City UK and the Law Society
  • MA in Law, Oxford University
Michaela Walker

Partner

Product Group Head, European Head Financial Services Sector

Michaela Walker

Partner

Product Group Head, European Head Financial Services Sector

Email