Pascal Leitmann

As an associate in our Finance & Financial Regulation practice group I advise national and international clients on financial regulatory and finance matters, focusing in particular on the intersection of financial regulation and technology.

In my years with the Finance & Financial Regulation practice group at Bird & Bird, which began during my legal studies at Goethe University Frankfurt, I gained deep knowledge of the increasingly regulated European financial sector.

Today, my advice focuses on assisting clients to implement innovative business models in this regulated landscape which aim to move forward digitalisation in the financial sector.

My advice includes aligning these business models with the respective regulatory law in the financial sector, including assisting credit institutions, financial service providers, payment service providers and crowdfunding service providers with prudential and market conduct regulation. In particular, my advice focuses on assisting service providers such as cloud computing service providers. In an economy which is characterised by division of labour, these companies provide regulated entities with information and communication technology solutions and are subject to financial regulatory requirements.

Consequently, my advice covers cross-sectoral issues relevant to this intersection of technology and financial regulation, in particular including cyber security regulation (which is regulated by a financial sector-specific regulation, the Digital Operational Resilience Act - DORA) as well as the usage of technology such as the Distributed Ledger Technology (utilised by crypto assets and regulated by the Markets in Crypto Assets Regulation - MiCAR) as well as the emerging usage of artificial intelligence in the financial sector. The use of artificial intelligence will also be integral to our legal advisory practice of the future, which I help to promote within initiatives at the firm.

My advice covers all aspects of banking and investment supervisory law, beginning with the structuring of the business model with view to license requirements, license application processes and investment structures, as well as ongoing advice in relation to intervention measures by supervisory authorities BaFin and ECB.

My experience also includes cross-border financing transactions, in particular the asset financing of renewable energies, in addition to all questions of insolvency law, corporate (finance) and international private law. This allows me to understand my clients' business models comprehensively, including transactional aspects when advising in a regulatory context.

Stages of my legal clerkship at the Frankfurt District Court led me to the Resolution Directorate of the German Financial Supervisory Authority (Bundesanstalt für Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht - BaFin), the financial supervisory department of a magic circle law firm as well as to the Permanent Mission of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United Nations in Vienna.