Gavin Punia

I am a financial regulation partner at Bird & Bird in our international Financial Regulation Group and international Payments Group. I advise clients on financial regulatory issues in the fintech and payments sector. I advise clients on a range of complex and cross-border regulatory issues relating to new products and transactions helping them navigate the evolving regulatory landscape.

I have extensive regulatory experience in payments and emoney, crypto, insurance distribution and investment services. I also provide advice to payment service providers across the payment chain such as account operators, card issuers, merchant acquirers, merchants and ecommerce platforms. I regularly advise firms in the financial services sector on the adoption and use of AI, blockchain, Web3 and smart data.

The combination of advising clients on rapidly developing financial services regulation with the development of digital technology enables me to give practical and pragmatic advice. This ranges from advising on organisational or governance requirements to advising on product specific issues across the development chain from regulatory perimeter issues, structuring the product and developing the contractual documentation.

My practice area also includes assisting firms with their compliance programmes for non-sector specific regimes such as anti-money laundering, bribery and corruption and market abuse, where I have advised a number of banks, payments and emoney firms, lenders, investment firms and insurers in recent years.

I have been recognised as one of the UK's top fintech lawyers for Payments & Lending by Chambers & Partners (Band 1). I have also been recognised as one of only 10 individuals across the globe by Financier Worldwide as a "Power Player" for Financial Services Regulation.

I am also committed to fostering a collaborative and inclusive culture at Bird & Bird and in the legal sector. I am partner sponsor of our UK social mobility network, Beyond Backgrounds.