Matthew Honeyben - Lehman Brothers insolvency

Matthew Honeyben studied Law and joined Linklaters in September 2007. His fourth seat as a trainee was spent in Litigation, working on the Lehman Brothers administration. Along with his colleagues, he's helping shape the commercial landscape.

The collapse of Lehman Brothers International (Europe) represented the largest and most high profile insolvency in history, sending shockwaves around the financial world. So to discover that I would be working on such a milestone transaction was a little daunting – but also incredibly exciting.

Even after Lehman Brothers went into administration, they were still holding various assets and monies on behalf of many counterparties and banks. One of the major challenges for PricewaterhouseCoopers, the administrators whom we were advising, was to work out the best way of returning those assets.

I have been working closely with partners and my principal, as well as colleagues from Litigation, Banking, Corporate and DSP. A transaction of this size and complexity had never been contemplated before. People across the firm were working on something that, in many respects, was without precedent, and it was a case of constantly learning in order to stay one step ahead. However, given that everything we were doing was so new, it was hard to predict the direction that the transaction would take next.

The way in which people pulled together at every stage of this transaction is testament to the ethos of teamwork that is so prevalent at Linklaters. There were many meetings to attend, across all workstreams, ensuring that everyone knew what was happening at each stage of the process. No one ever found themselves working in isolation. I have faced many incredible challenges working on the Lehman Brothers administration, but I have always had the support around me to overcome them.

This case continues to give me first-hand experience of the magnitude and complexity of work that Linklaters is renowned for. What I’m dealing with can’t be read about in a textbook, you can’t study it at university, and you can’t just look it up – it really is history in the making. As a firm we have come together to help resolve what is an extraordinary situation and we do it all under considerable interest and scrutiny from the wider markets. I still find it remarkable that I’m part of something so historically significant.

I have now qualified into Litigation and I’m looking forward to having even more involvement on the Lehman Brothers administration.