Thomas C. Mellor

Tom is the contributing editor of the International Comparative Legal Guide to: Lending and Secured Finance 2019, published by Global Legal Group in partnership with the LSTA, LMA, and APLMA.

Representative clients include Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase Bank, Citibank, HSBC, Deutsche Bank, National Bank of Kuwait, Nedbank, Santander, SMBC, Norinchukin Bank, Fuyo Leasing, Jefferies Finance, Prudential, Auramet Trading, Bentham Capital, Ares Capital, Lascaux Resources, and Toyota.

Prior to joining Morgan Lewis, Tom was a partner in another international law firm, where he served as the co-chair of the firm’s Latin America practice.

Syndicated Lending. Tom works on a variety of syndicated lending arrangements and has experience working through issues common to cross-border/global syndicated facilities, including multicurrency and collateral-sharing arrangements. Transactions include representation of SMBC as arranger and agent in a $400 million term loan for Bunge Limited, syndicated to the regional bank market in Japan; representation of Bank of America as arranger and agent in a $600 million term loan and revolving facilities for Focus Financial; representation of Bank of America as arranger and agent in $700 million in global facilities for OSI; representation of HSBC as arranger and agent in $300 million in term loan facilities for Pinebridge Investments; representation of HSBC as arranger and agent in $500 million in facilities for Swire Properties, Inc; representation of Jefferies Finance as arranger and agent in the $120 million financing for Maritime Telecommunications Network; representation of JPMorgan Chase Bank as arranger and agent in a $300 million financing for The Burton Corporation; representation of JPMorgan Chase Bank as arranger and agent in a $150 million financing for Moody’s Corporation; representation of JPMorgan Chase Bank as arranger and agent in $125 million in facilities for Idexx; representation of HSBC as arranger and agent in a $150 million financing for American Eagle; representation of HSBC as US agent in the approximately $120 million financing for AES Drilling Fluids; representation of HSBC as US agent in the $CDN150 million financing for Xtreme Coil Drilling Corp.; representation of HSBC in a $1 billion in loans to Petrobras, syndicated to the market with participation agreements; and representation of Tempur-pedic, as borrower in approximately $640 million in global facilities. In partnership with the LSTA, LMA, and APLMA, Tom is the contributing editor of The International Comparative Legal Guide to Lending and Secured Finance 2019, published by Global Legal Group.

Latin America. Tom represents lenders in syndicated, club, and bilateral loan transactions in Latin America in the corporate lending, project finance, trade finance, and restructuring areas. Since 2013, Tom has represented lenders in more than 30 corporate lending transactions in Latin America across a wide variety of business sectors, including natural resources, financial services, infrastructure, and retail, with such borrowers as Codelco, Petrobras, Braskem, Banco de Chile, CFE, Cargill Argentina, Hancock Chile, Hyundai Brasil, Caixa, Samarco, Banco Santander (Brasil) S.A., Tractabel, Elektro, WEG Equipamentos Electricos, CPFL Energia, Banco de Credito Inversiones, Bladex, Tavex, Nufarm Industria Quimica e Farmaceutica, and Agrex do Brasil. Tom has worked on secured financings and project financings for a number of mining companies in Latin America, including some of the largest project financings in the region. Tom has assisted financial institutions in preparing form loan documentation for Brazilian and Mexican borrowers and has advised corporate clients in connection with investments in the region. He worked on the restructuring of the Petrozuata project (Latin Lawyer Restructuring Deal of the Year) and Fertinitro project in Venezuela after these projects were nationalized by the Venezuelan government, and creditors to Durango, the Mexican paper company. Tom is the author of “China’s Investments in Latin America: Themes, Challenges and Future Trends,” which appeared in the Winter 2012 volume of Global Infrastructure.  

Leveraged Finance. Tom represents senior lenders, first and second lien lenders, mezzanine investors, and borrowers in leveraged financings, including acquisition and recapitalization facilities. Transactions include representation of Bank of America as arranger and agent in $600 million of facilities for Focus Financial; representation of Bank of America as arranger and agent in approximately $700 million in facilities for OSI; representation of Jefferies Finance as arranger and agent in the $120 million financing for Maritime Telecommunications Network; representation of JPMorgan Chase Bank as arranger and agent in a $300 million financing for The Burton Corporation; representation of HSBC as US agent in the approximately $120 million financing for AES Drilling Fluids; representation of Tempur-pedic, as borrower in approximately $640 million in facilities; representation of HSBC as US agent in the $CDN150 million financing for Xtreme Coil Drilling Corp., representation of Abacus Finance in $12 million financing for Persante Healthcare; representation of JPMorgan Chase Bank in $46 million in facilities for Lincoln Paper and Tissue; representation of JPMorgan Chase Bank in approximately $25 million in facilities for HiTouch Business Services; representation of Ares Capital in $85 million in facilities for a fast food franchisee; representation of Ares Capital in approximately $40 million in facilities to a retail store chain; and representation of Ares Capital in approximately $600 million financing for a provider of kidney dialysis services. 

Distressed/Restructuring. Tom works on distressed credit and restructuring transactions in a variety of contexts. Transactions include representation of Bank of America as agent in the restructuring of credit facilities for a medical serves company whereby the lenders became the equity holders of the company; representation of bondholders of the Fertinitro project in Venezuela after nationalization of the project by the Venezuelan government and subsequent negotiated tender offer with PDVSA; representation of creditors to a leading movie studio; representation of creditors to a monoline insurer; representation of lenders with more than $1 billion of exposure to AIG Group in connection with “contested” borrowing requests; representation of bondholders of the Petrozuata project in Venezuela after nationalization of the project by the Venezuelan government and subsequent negotiated tender offer with PDVSA (Latin Lawyer Restructuring Deal of the Year); representation of creditors in the restructuring of Durango, the Mexican paper company, pursuant to a concurso filing in Mexico; and representation of UBS, as agent, in connection with credit facilities for Atkins, pursuant to a restructuring of the company through a bankruptcy filing.

Project Finance. Tom works on a wide variety of project finance transactions, especially in the natural resources area, and has also worked on the restructuring of these transactions. Transactions include representation of debt providers to the Regulus project, located in Kern County, California (named "North American Renewables Deal of the Year" by Infrastructure Journal and Project Finance Magazine), with permanent debt provided by Prudential and Santander and the tax equity provided by Google; representation of Nedbank in the project financing of the Nord silver mine in Arizona; representation of creditors in the restructuring of the Petrozuata project (Latin Lawyer Restructuring Deal of the Year) and Fertinitro project in Venezuela after these projects were nationalized by the Venezuelan government; representation of a European export credit agency in the project financing of four methanol projects in Trinidad; representation of lenders and export credit agencies in secured financings and project financings for a number of mining projects, including the Pirquitas mine in Argentina, the El Abra project in Chile, the Collahuasi project in Chile, the Antamina project in Peru, and the Batu Hijau project in Indonesia.

Mining and Natural Resources. Tom represents lenders to natural resources companies, as well as working on the restructuring of these transactions. He recently closed transactions with a number of the largest natural resource companies in the world, including five transactions with an aggregate value of more than $2 billion for Petrobras, the Brazilian state-owned oil company and $1 billion in facilities for Codelco, the Chilean state-owned copper company. Tom has also represented lenders to a number of junior and midtier mining and natural resource companies, including Nord Resources, Meridian Gold, Silver Standard, Jaguar Mining, Queenstake Resources, Mid-Tennessee Zinc Corporation, Excellon Resources, Fortune Minerals and Fortune Revenue Silver Mines. Tom has experience representing lenders to some of the largest mining project financings in the world, including the El Abra project in Chile, the Collahuasie project in Chile, the Antamina project in Peru, and the Batu Hijau project in Indonesia.

Trade Finance. Tom has experience with a variety of trade finance structures and has assisted banks and nonbank lenders in preparing documentation forms for use with Brazilian, Mexican, and Argentine trade finance customers. Tom has represented lenders with such trade finance clients as Petrobras, WEG Equipamentos Electricos, Cargill Argentina, and Kingston Technology.

Litigation Finance. Tom works with one of the leading global litigation funding providers and assists in structuring and negotiating innovative financing solutions for the US litigation finance market.