Management |
Steven T. Kargman | Bio

Steven T. Kargman is the founder and President of KARGMAN ASSOCIATES, a New York City-based strategic advisory firm specializing in international restructurings. The firm provides strategic advice to clients involved in complex and challenging International restructuring, distressed debt and cross-border insolvency situations. He was formerly the senior restructuring lawyer with the Export-Import Bank of the United States in Washington, D.C.

At Ex-Im Bank, he specialized in restructuring and project finance transactions in the emerging markets and served as the Lead Attorney for the Bank’s Asset Management Division (the Bank’s Division responsible for restructurings and workouts). He has worked on major restructuring and project finance transactions throughout Latin America and Asia in such countries as Brazil, China, Colombia, India, Indonesia, Mexico, the Philippines, Singapore, Turkey and Venezuela.

Among other major transactions, he worked on the $13.9 billion Asia Pulp & Paper restructuring as well as two of the most significant project finance restructurings in Indonesia, the Paiton and Jawa power project restructurings. He was also involved with the Dabhol power project restructuring in India, and he worked on some of the largest restructuring matters in Mexico and elsewhere in Latin America. [> go to Representative Transactions]

He has interacted with senior officials in the private and public sectors throughout Latin America and Asia. He has also worked closely with senior officers of other creditor institutions, both public and private, in the US and abroad and has played a leadership role on several creditor steering committees and export credit agency working groups.

He previously served as General Counsel of the New York State Financial Control Board, New York State’s chief financial oversight agency for New York City, practiced corporate finance with the international law firm of Debevoise & Plimpton in New York, and served as a law clerk to the Hon. Gilbert S. Merritt of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.

He has appeared on panels and lectured widely in the US and abroad on international restructuring and project finance topics. In August 2004, he served as a visiting lecturer for a course on international law in Rio de Janeiro sponsored by the Organization of American States. In addition, among other speaking engagements, he has lectured and appeared on panels before the American Bar Association, the Asian Institute of International Financial Law, the Association of the Bar of the City of New York (Committee on Project Finance), the Center for American and International Law (formerly known as the Southwestern Legal Foundation), The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, the Forum on Asian Insolvency Reform, INSOL Europe, the International Bar Association, the International Insolvency Institute, the Institute of Asian-Pacific Business Law, the International Law Association (American Branch), the International Project Finance Association, the National University of Singapore Centre for the Study of Commercial Law, the United States-Mexico Law Institute, the U.S. Department of State Advisory Committee on Private International Law, and the Yale Law School Center for the Study of Corporate Law. [> go to Speaking Engagements]

He has published a number of articles on international finance topics in leading professional publications, including China Business Review, The International Economy, International Financial Law Review, The Journal of Private Equity, and The Journal of Structured and Project Finance. His publications include a three-part series in International Financial Law Review on the major challenges of emerging market restructurings and an article in the Spring 2005 issue of The Journal of Private Equity—Special Turnaround Management Issue entitled “Opportunities and Pitfalls in Emerging Market Restructurings: A Strategic Perspective.” [> go to Publications]

He served as a member of the official United States delegation for the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) project on the development of a legislative guide for insolvency law and has been an adviser to the World Bank and the U.S. Department of State on international insolvency issues. He served from 2001-2004 as an adjunct faculty member at American University’s Washington College of Law for a course on international project finance.

He is a founding member and a member of the Board of Directors of the International Insolvency Institute, a leading international insolvency organization. He also serves as Vice-Chair of the Subcommittee on International Bankruptcy of the American Bar Association's Business Bankruptcy Committee. He is a Fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy, an honorary association of leading bankruptcy and insolvency professionals, and serves as a member of the advisory board of the Institute of Asian-Pacific Business Law. In addition, he is a member of INSOL International, the International Bar Association (Section on Insolvency, Restructuring, and Creditors' Rights), the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, and the American Bankruptcy Institute.

He is also a member of the American Indonesian Chamber of Commerce, the Brazilian-American Chamber of Commerce, EMTA (Emerging Market Traders Association), and the United States-Mexico Chamber of Commerce (Northeast chapter).

He received his J.D. from Yale Law School, where he was an editor of the Yale Law Journal, chairman of the Yale Association of International Law, and chairman of Yale Legislative Services. A former Luce Scholar in Singapore, he received his B.A. with Honors from Swarthmore College (Phi Beta Kappa), where he was awarded the Flack Achievement Award and Sarah Kaighn Cooper Scholarship for academic distinction.