Overview
At Gunster, our goal is to deliver practical and effective guidance on securities and corporate governance matters; to provide the business and legal experience and dedication our clients expect and deserve; and to be responsive to our clients and their needs.
Our attorneys handle offerings that range from the first round of financing to the initial public offering and beyond. We represent companies raising capital; private equity, venture capital and other types of investors; and underwriters and placement agents in a broad range of transactions, including:
- Angel financing
- Venture and private equity financing
- Private placements
- Initial public offerings
- Follow-on offerings
- Shelf registration statements
- deSPAC transactions
- Mergers, acquisitions and dispositions
- Initial coin, security token, and equity token offerings; nonfungible tokens, and decentralized autonomous organizations
We work with public companies to prepare periodic reports and proxy statements. Our team assists publicly held clients with preparing filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, state securities commissions and stock exchanges. We strive to scale each representation to fit the client’s needs, ranging from a simple rules check to ensure that the filing complies with constantly changing rules, to a more comprehensive approach where our attorneys are more actively involved and provide guidance on disclosure trends and investor expectations.
Gunster is committed to serving as a trusted legal advisor to boards of directors, committees and executives faced with high-risk situations. Our attorneys aim to deliver the steadfast, independent counsel that can only be offered by a firm that has advised many similarly situated clients. Our attorneys advise boards, committees and officers of public and private companies on a wide range of matters, including insider purchases and sales, director independence and fiduciary duties, internal investigations, and mergers and acquisitions, as well as bet-the-company litigation. Our team is dedicated to designing a sturdy legal framework that incorporates leading practices while never losing sight of business objectives.
We help clients to structure executive compensation and benefit plans and agreements for the C-Suite and other employees. We advise on equity and other incentive plans; employment, severance and consulting agreements; and bonus, deferred compensation, and employee stock purchase plans. We strive not only to assist with the recruitment and retention of key executives based on what is “market” for the particular circumstances or industry, but also to reduce the potential for future disputes.
Our team defends securities and corporate governance claims in litigation. Whether a client is a fast-growing high-tech company or a Fortune 100 international organization, our mission is to be the law firm that businesses turn to when confronted with securities litigation. We represent companies and their directors and officers in a wide variety of matters, including class actions and derivative securities fraud claims based on state and federal securities laws, breach of fiduciary duty and negligence, among others. Our lawyers also conduct internal investigations for public and private corporations on matters ranging from whistleblower complaints and allegations of executive improprieties to corporate governance and human resources practices. We focus on providing an objective analysis to help clients readily assess their potential exposure, if any, and on reputation management and potential remedial measures, including whether to self-report any problematic conduct discovered.
In the compliance arena, our attorneys work with clients who have regular commercial activity in Latin America and beyond to institute vigorous FCPA compliance programs with effective controls for detecting and eradicating questionable payments, and we are well versed in anti-corruption laws in numerous foreign jurisdictions, such as the UK Bribery Act.
Our attorneys aspire to be known as thought leaders and innovators. A selection our team members have worked for Wall Street law firms or as in-house counsel for Fortune 500 companies and serve as speakers and educators at important business and legal conferences. Gunster attorneys are also solicited for opinions by the media on new developments in securities laws and corporate governance trends. In addition, we publish brief e-alerts that strive to keep clients abreast of important SEC and other developments, as well as a blog, The Securities Edge, that addresses issues of the day in an easy-to-understand voice and format that helps executives to remain up-to-speed in running their businesses.
