Counsel for the hemisphere; when it comes to legal matters, Miami is the hub of the Americas. One more reason why the permanent secretariat of the FTAA should be based here - International

South Florida CEO, August, 2003 by J.P. Faber

A $400 million bond issue by a Brazilian wood pulp producer. A $250 million securitization of exports for Latin America's leading miner of iron ore. The settlement of a royalty dispute between a Japanese manufacturer and a Nicaraguan distributor.

What do these deals have in common? In all three cases, a Miami law firm represented the principles--in the above cases, respectively, Greenberg Traurig gave legal counsel to Aracruz Celulose, White & Case represented Brazil's CVRD and Akerman Senterfitt argued the case for the Nicaraguan distributor.

"There is a growing recognition that there is a depth of legal expertise in international arbitration and litigation here in South Florida," says Burton Landy, chairman emeritus of the 60-lawyer international practice group of Akerman Senterfitt. "We ourselves have a very active international practice."

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As one of the early founders of the Commercial Dispute Resolution Center of the Americas, an organization dedicated to making Miami the center for arbitration between US-based and Latin American firms, Landy brings a keen insight to the practice. "The center is also trying to negotiate provisions into the FTAA [Free Trade Area of the Americas] for dispute resolution," says Landy, "that the parties can choose where the arbitration can take place, but that as a default it would be held at the place of the secretariat."

That prize--the permanent secretariat for the FTAA--is currently up for grabs in a five-way contest between Miami, Panama City, Pueblo (Mexico), Port of Spain (Trinidad and Tobago) and Atlanta. FTAA Inc., the organization enjoined by Gov. Jeb Bush to lobby for its location in Florida, has put forward numerous arguments in favor of Miami; few are as pointed as the legal infrastructure that South Florida offers.

"I must confess I'm not entirely objective, since I'm on the board that is trying to bring the organization to Miami," says Shanker Singham, chairman of the International Trade & Competition Group of Steel Hector & Davis. "But if this was a decision being made in the realm of pure logic, then Miami would win very easily."

With 60 lawyers in Latin America, and another 40 or 50 outside of Latin America who do international work, Steel Hector's international division is able to mix and match legal practices from different foreign countries. Singham's trade and competition group, a 15-lawyer unit of the international division, works on projects in Latin America ranging from trademark protection for French spirits company Remy Cointreau to making sure that DHL does not face unfair pricing from domestic postal companies in the region.

Part of what firms like Steel Hector offer is global connections through Miami. Baker & McKenzie, for example, has 62 offices in 35 countries. Its Miami office coordinates activities in Mexico, Venezuela, Argentina, Chile and Colombia, typically representing companies doing international transactions in energy, power, banking, high tech and manufacturing. "The companies are from anywhere in world--a Japanese company in Brazil, or a French company in Mexico," says Baker & McKenzie partner Gene Rostov. "A home grown [Latin American] firm may not have the connections in the other parts of the globe."

Lawyers who work in Miami are also well-versed in the legal systems of Latin countries--and speak the language. "You have quite a few lawyers here who are bilingual, English-Spanish, or English-Portuguese," says Rostov. "And you have people here who are doing a lot of trans-border transactions, who are familiar with the legal systems abroad, especially in the Americas."

"There are two things happening," says Cesar Alvarez, managing partner for Miami-based Greenberg Traurig. "In the Latin American practice that you do from Miami, most international transactions are documented in US or UK law, particularly anything done in finance. But the due diligence needs to be done in Spanish or Portuguese. So the ability to have a large number of lawyers who can operate under the common law legal system, where the documentation occurs, but who understand the civil law, and the language and laws of those countries--there is no place that has the same number of sophisticated lawyers as South Florida."

While all of the above may be true, what really puts Miami on the map as the legal center for the Americas is its position as a place to resolve international disputes. A major step in recognizing that position occurred in June at the annual meeting of the New York-based American Arbitration Association, when it signed an agreement with the Inter-American Bar Association, a federation of all of the national bar associations in the hemisphere.

"The interesting part of that agreement is that it agreed to promote Miami as the place [for arbitration] and the place to train arbitrators," says Landy. "Miami is recognized and treated as a kind of neutral place. Parties from Latin America are comfortable here."

"I believe the American Arbitration Association's own recognition that Miami is a place where you focus your organizing efforts for the development of an international arbitration [center for the Americas] speaks volumes," says Tony Santos, partner in Miami law firm Concepcion, Rojas and Santos and current president of the Commercial Dispute Resolution Center. "Moreover, you have corporations far and wide, based here and elsewhere, that choose Miami as the site for dispute resolution."