Blake Dawson Waldron has acted as Australian legal adviser on the largest ever trans-Tasman deal - ANZs A$4.9bn acquisition of The National Bank of New Zealand from Lloyds TSB and related A$3.6bn capital raising.

The firm advised Australian and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd and ANZ Banking Group (New Zealand) Ltd on the $3.6bn raising done by way of a 2:11 pro rata renounceable rights issue, including assisting in preparing the prospectus. The issue closed on 24 November 2003.

Bell Gully was lead counsel and New Zealand law adviser on the A$4.9bn acquisition, which closed on 1 December 2003. ANZ's other advisers included Sullivan & Cromwell (US law) and Slaughter and May (UK law), with Morgan Stanley acting as financial adviser, and as joint underwriter with Citigroup, Ernst & Young as accounting adviser, and KPMG as auditor.

Chapman Tripp represented Lloyds TSB Bank Plc as vendor, with Deutsche Bank acting as investment banking advisers.

The transaction marks New Zealand's largest M&A deal and Australia's largest rights issue. ANZ is now the largest bank in New Zealand, which is expected to account for around 30% of ANZs profits. 

A team from Blakes including partners David Williamson, Elspeth Arnold, Sarah Dulhunty, Nick Terry and Roger Davies worked closely with ANZ group general counsel and ex-Allens Arthur Robinson partner Tim L'Estrange and joint deputy general counsel, Peter Stirling and Tim Paine on the deal.

Williamson said keeping the timetable for the capital raising to a minimum was a key consideration. "It seems likely that the shortened timetable we worked to will be adopted by ASX as the standard, to facilitate access by listed companies to shareholder equity, given the usual transaction timing constraints."