Latham & Watkins LLP

Sam Maxson advises clients across the fintech and payments ecosystem on their highest stakes strategic, regulatory and structuring matters.

Drawing on over a decade of experience, Sam leverages a deep understanding of the global regulatory landscape and market insight to provide pragmatic advice to emerging and established companies, financial institutions, investors, and governmental authorities on:

• Digital assets/crypto, tokenization, Web3, and decentralized finance (DeFi)
• Payment services and systems
• Securities/derivatives laws
• Financial markets infrastructure
• Credit/lending
• Anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing
• Regulator advocacy and engagement

Having advised on industry-leading blockchain and digital assets matters since 2016, he was an early adopter of a fintech-first approach. Sam has guided many of the world’s most prominent businesses in the fintech and payments sectors on complex legal and regulatory challenges, as well as central banks and regulators on designing and implementing fintech and payments regulatory frameworks.

Sam also frequently provides specialist financial regulatory advice on fundraising, M&A, and capital markets matters involving fintech and financial services sector issuers and targets.

Sam unlocks the resources of the firm’s robust global platform to coordinate advice from Latham colleagues and local counsel around the world for clients, facilitating seamless access to leading international advice for clients in Asia and around the world.

A recognized leader at the firm, Sam is a member of the firm’s global Training and Career Enhancement Committee (TACE) and serves as the Deputy Money Laundering Reporting Officer for the Hong Kong office.

Before joining Latham, he practiced in the London office of another global law firm. During this time, he worked in Tokyo and completed secondments at a global investment bank and a global insurer