Stuart Leach
Stuart Leach
Founder of Stuart Leach Associates | Stuart Leach Associates
JURISDICTION
United Kingdom
TOP SPECIALISMS
Civil Fraud
Commercial Litigation
Reputation and Crisis Management
Office Location
United Kingdom
Short Biography
After completing my MA in Jurisprudence at Oxford University, I transitioned from a successful 18-year career in advertising at major agencies working on many leading brands, to become a barrister. In 2004, I was called to the Bar and practiced at Pump Court Chambers in the Temple. In 2013, I merged my expertise in communications and law to establish a specialist communications service protecting reputation for those involved in disputes. Over the past ten years, I have worked on a wide range of case, in 23 different jurisdictions, helping clients ranging from sovereign entities to UHNWs. Stuart Leach Associates has a high-quality team with legal and communications experts, and former journalist, providing top class reputation advice. The consultancy is focused, agile, conflict free, and committed to providing real returns on reputation expenditure along with the highest standards of client service.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
What was your first job?
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
Stuart Smyth
Stuart Smyth
Counsel | Maurice Turnor Gardner
JURISDICTION
TOP SPECIALISMS
Estates: Planning
Relocation and Cross-Border Advisory
Trusts: Planning
Office Location
United Kingdom
Short Biography
Stuart has a broad practice across private wealth matters. His experience includes advising UK centric clients on their estate planning, Wills and Lasting Powers of Attorneys. He also has extensive experience advising international clients (families, entrepreneurs, family offices and trustees) on complex international tax planning which often involves cross-border aspects. Stuart advises individuals on their pre-arrival planning when coming to the UK and provides on-going advice on the UK system once UK tax resident. His expertise includes advising families on the establishment and governance of asset holding structures. He has particular interest and experience in private corporate matters such as the re-organisation of private companies when it is time for control and value to be passed to the next generation.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
Apulia
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
What was your first job?
Painter and decorator during the school holidays
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
The Years of Lyndon Johnson by Robert Caro (especillaly volume 2!)
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
Sue Laing
Sue Laing
Consultant | Boodle Hatfield
JURISDICTION
TOP SPECIALISMS
Estates: Planning
Family Governance and Business
Trusts: Planning
Office Location
United Kingdom
Short Biography
Throughout her professional career Sue Laing has advised wealthy UK and international clients and their trustees who hold complex assets, including valuable private businesses, on long term protection and devolution. She provides expert guidance on succession planning, long-term asset protection, capital and income taxes, trusts, private companies, partnerships and the family businesses themselves dovetailing both legal and practical advice. Sue was bestowed ‘Outstanding Contribution’ at the Chambers and Partners HNW Awards 2023 and was described as ‘a hugely well-respected figure in the private wealth scene around the world’ going on to say she ‘is one of the best lawyers in the industry.. known as the doyenne of the landed estate world’.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
Never part on bad terms with anyone however badly you think that they have behaved.
What was your first job?
Assistant under matron in a Salisbury prep school!
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
Sunita Singh-Dalal
Sunita Singh-Dalal
Partner, Head of Private Wealth & Family Offices | Hourani & Partners
JURISDICTION
Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, India, England and Wales
TOP SPECIALISMS
Estates: Planning
Family Governance and Business
Family Office
Office Location
United Arab Emirates
Short Biography
Sunita advises significant business families, private clients, trustees, private banks, regulatory authorities and foreign law firms on Cross Border Estate and Succession Planning, Wealth Management, formulating and implementing Family Codes of Governance, Family Constitutions and establishing Family Offices. Sunita is internationally known for dedicating time to teaching and spreading awareness of current legal and practical updates and developments in the regional private wealth sector. She is a full member of STEP and regularly chairs international wealth management forums, being highly respected by the Global Private Client Industry. Sunita is regarded as a leading authority on Middle Eastern private client issues by global private wealth industry groups and has been consistently ranked by Chambers and Partners as a Private Client and High Net Worth Adviser. She received the 2022 Private Client Lawyer of the Year Award and promotes women's empowerment in MENA and SW Asia.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
What was your first job?
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
With the introduction of legislation in the Middle East focused on protecting and sustaining family businesses together with recent fiscal incentives, I expect a consistent increase in the number of family offices being established. Codes of Governance incorporated within cross-border succession plans will inevitably become more prevalent.
Suzanne Johnston
Suzanne Johnston
Partner | Stephenson Harwood
JURISDICTION
TOP SPECIALISMS
Estates: Planning
Trusts: Planning
Tax Advisory
Office Location
Singapore
Short Biography
Suzanne heads Stephenson Harwood LLP's Singapore private wealth practice. She specialises in UK tax and international wealth planning, focusing on advising HNWI, professional trustees, family offices and private banks in Asia. She has in-depth experience across different practice areas within private wealth, and in multiple jurisdictions throughout the APAC region, bolstered by having lived and worked in Singapore for a decade. Suzanne was in-house legal counsel at a private bank and trust company, giving her a unique insight. She was recognised as a recommended lawyer for private wealth and family law by The Legal 500 2023 and ranked in Chambers & Partners High Net Worth Guide 2023 where she was praised as "exceptionally attentive" and "technically astounding". Suzanne writes on impact investing and acts as a mentor on her firm's female career progression programmes. She is passionate about raising awareness of infertility and baby loss in the legal sector.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
Luke's - best steak in Singapore!
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
One story is good until another story is told.
What was your first job?
Selling shoes at "Barratts Shoes" in Preston for GBP2.00 per hour plus bonus for pushing shoe polish!
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
"The Silence In Between" by Josie Ferguson. I haven't read it yet, as it's only being published in June but Josie is my best friend so...
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
I never "expect" anything but I hope we will continue to support each other and grow. I believe we have something special!
Toby Crooks
Toby Crooks
Partner | Rawlinson & Hunter
JURISDICTION
England and Wales
TOP SPECIALISMS
Family Office
Trusts: Planning
Tax Advisory
Office Location
United Kingdom
Short Biography
Toby specialises in the field of Private Client Tax. He enjoys working closely with clients, legal advisers and Family Offices to understand their particular requirements and has a wide breadth of experience, having advised both UK and non domiciled clients. Toby joined Rawlinson & Hunter in 2004, working initially in the Private Client department before transferring to the Firm's Cayman Islands office for several years . He returned to the UK in 2010 and became a partner in April 2014. Toby is a Chartered Accountant, Chartered Tax Adviser and a member of the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners (STEP). He is the holder of an Advanced Diploma in International Trust Management and is a member of PAIAM (Professional Advisers in the Art Market.) He was previously the representative for the City of London on the Worldwide Council of STEP and is a member of the Public Policy Committee.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
Margot, 45 Great Queen Street, London WC2B 5AA
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
Approach each new relationship with the mindset that you are meeting a new friend
What was your first job?
Working on the production line in a packaging factory
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
The Pyramid of Lies: The Prime Minister, the Banker and the Billion-Pound Scandal by Duncan Mavin
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
Increased preoccupation with forthcoming UK general election
Shan Warnock-Smith KC
Shan Warnock-Smith KC
King's Counsel | ICT Chambers
JURISDICTION
Cayman Islands, England and Wales, Bermuda, Hong Kong SAR, British Virgin Islands, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago
TOP SPECIALISMS
Estates: Contentious
Trusts: Contentious
Trusts: Planning
Office Location
Cayman Islands
Short Biography
Shan is a prominent English KC and an international advisor and litigator specialising in trusts, other wealth structures and estates. She travels the world from her base in the Cayman Islands and is to be found "everywhere" according to the guides who also describe her as being at "the pinnacle of her profession and sheer class". Shan also acts as a protector, s director of a private trust company and a mediator of trust and estates disputes.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
Caprice at the Four Seasons in Hong Kong
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
Never believe your own publicity
What was your first job?
riveting boxes in a metal box factory
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
Thus Was Adonis Murdered by Sarah Caudwell
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
More stress-testing existing structures in light of increased attacks on trusts from regulators and others
Simon Gibb
Simon Gibb
Partner | McDermott Will & Emery
JURISDICTION
TOP SPECIALISMS
Family Office
Trusts: Planning
Tax Advisory
Office Location
United Kingdom
Short Biography
Simon heads MWE's London private client team, focusing on mult-jurisdictional families and providing tax, succession, disclosure, structuring and governance advie.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
There are no indispensable people, just indispensable roles,
What was your first job?
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
Simon Goldring
Simon Goldring
Partner | Fladgate
JURISDICTION
TOP SPECIALISMS
Dispute Resolution or Arbitration
Trusts & Trusteeship
Trusts: Contentious
Office Location
United Kingdom
Short Biography
Simon is recognised as a leading Private Wealth litigator. His experience spans a range of contentious matters, notably onshore and offshore trusts disputes. Simon's practice has developed from his private client background, enabling him to approach litigation from a client-centric perspective.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
Cafe du Marche
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
Change requires disruption
What was your first job?
Football coach & referee
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy remains a classic
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?
A focus on value for clients rather than a "time-spent" approach
Simon Jennings
Simon Jennings
Senior Consultant | Evelyn Partners
JURISDICTION
England and Wales
TOP SPECIALISMS
Accountancy
Trusts & Trusteeship
Tax Advisory
Office Location
United Kingdom
Short Biography
Areas of expertisePrivate Client Tax Services; Foreign Domiciliary Taxation and Remittance Basis; Residence and Domicile; International Private Client Tax; Estate Planning; Inheritance Tax; Trust Formation, Administration and Accounting; International Trust Planning; Residential Property Taxation; Taxation of Land; Employee Remuneration; Capital Gains Tax; Charity Formation, Administration and Taxation ExperienceSimon joined Smith & Williamson in May 2017 after 30 years as a partner at Rawlinson & Hunter. He has advised on international structuring and private client taxation since 1979. His clients are international families and high net worth individuals, many of whom are resident but not domiciled in the UK. He has acted as an Expert Witness on several occasions, in both criminal forensic proceedings and civil litigation particularly in relation to trusts.
What is your favorite restaurant to take a client or colleague to?
What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?
What was your first job?
What is the book you recommend to everyone?
What changes do you expect to see in your practice over the next year?