Clifford Chance wins FT Innovative Lawyer Award

Clifford Chance has been awarded the Corporate Social Responsibility Award 2007 at the Financial Times Innovative Lawyers ceremony in London for its pro-bono work with long-standing client, Citi.

The award was in recognition of the development of a legal template that helps Microfinance institutions (MFIs) gain access to large-scale commercial funding.

Citi Microfinance, a specialist group that works with the microfinance sector, approached Clifford Chance to work with them to develop an industry template that would enable transactions to take place on a consistent, policy compliant and cost-effective basis. RELATED EXPERTISE Community Affairs

The resulting model agreement can be used in both common and civil law countries on a wide range of local and cross-border lending structures under local or English law. Once validated for a country, individual transactions can be documented through the completion of a simple schedule without the need for external legal input or cost.

The model has been translated into French, Spanish and Russian and it is estimated that it will initially be used as a vehicle for loans of over $200m to MFIs in more than 30 countries.