Bhong Paulo A. Macasaet

Bhong Paulo A. Macasaet is a partner in SyCip Salazar Hernandez & Gatmaitan. He is a member of the Firm’s special projects and banking groups. His areas of practice include mergers, acquisitions, aviation, and banking and finance.

Bhong has experience in several high-value transactions, including acquisitions other forms of investments, as well as financing.

He has assisted clients in investment structuring and establishing corporate vehicles, drafting and reviewing corporate agreements and rendering advisory opinions on day-to-day corporate matters. He has assisted in legal due diligence and rendered transaction advice involving commercial lending, mergers and acquisitions, investments and divestments, capital restructuring and corporate reorganizations in the industries of, among others, real estate, infrastructure, power, food, animal health, telecommunications, casino, financing and investment management.

He has acted as counsel for clients (both sellers and buyers) in the preparation, drafting, and negotiation of power supply agreements. Just recently, he has also assisted a client in concluding an investment agreement, with an operations and management agreement for a water supply company.

Bhong has various experience in assisting clients for high-value government bidding on infrastructure projects, both for solicited and unsolicited proposals. He has a wide experience in financing, namely, drafting and negotiating omnibus loans and security agreements and corporate notes facility agreements, both for commercial lending and project financing. His recent financing transactions include a project financing for a hospital and an international airport.

He also has experience in assisting clients in various and numerous aviation transactions, including aircraft and engine leases, aircraft financing and refinancing. His aviation experience includes reviewing and drafting of transaction documentations involving Philippine-registered aircrafts, providing advice on Philippine law formalities and registration requirements for security arrangements on aircrafts, and assisting clients on regulatory matters involving aircrafts operated in the Philippines. He has assisted in the financing and delivery of the first two B777 aircrafts to a Philippine airline. Just last year, he has assisted a syndicate of banks in the financing of numerous deliveries of Boeing and Airbus aircraft to Philippine Airlines, the national flag carrier.

Bhong is a graduate of the University of the Philippines where he obtained his undergraduate and law degrees. He was an active member of the UP Law Debate and Moot Union, and was part of the team that represented the Philippines in the 2008 Law Asia Moot Court Competition in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia where the Philippines ranked second in the competition.