American Bar Association Honors Penelope Christophorou with Glass Cutter Award for Business Law Contributions

NEW YORK, April 17, 2026: The American Bar Association (ABA) Business Law Section has honored Morgan Lewis partner Penelope Christophorou with its 2026 Jean Allard Glass Cutter Award. The award is given each year to a woman business lawyer who has made significant contributions to the profession and the Business Law Section.

A former chair of the ABA Business Law Section and a special advisor to the ABA Commission on Women in the Profession, Penny was selected for her influential leadership and lasting impacts to the ABA’s largest section, as well as for her highly regarded practice in commercial finance, derivatives, and bankruptcy-related matters.

Penny’s practice focused on commercial financings and creditors’ rights and includes advising on and negotiating new products involving collateral, securities and digital asset holding arrangements, derivatives, repo and other securities finance transactions, structured financings, and workouts. She also counsels on closeout and netting rights under the US Bankruptcy Code and other insolvency regimes, including opinion-giving requiring safe harbor treatment. She is currently working extensively with market participants in preparing for the mandatory clearing of some cash trades and virtually all repos in US treasuries, including commenting on the applicable rules and on negotiating trading documentation.

Penny is active in several professional and community organizations. She is currently on the Law and Compliance Executive Committee of the Futures Industry Association, is a member of the American Law Institute (a nonprofit with a mission to improve and reform the law), and on the board of directors of the Citizens Union, a nonprofit that works to enhance good governance in New York City and New York State. Penny previously served as chair of the Business Law Section’s Uniform Commercial Code Committee, is a former president of the American College of Commercial Finance Lawyers, and a former chair of the Uniform State Laws Committee of the New York City Bar Association.