Our team

Hannes Vallikivi has more than 20 years of practice  in the areas of banking and finance, insurance law, securities law, mergers and acquisitions and general corporate law.

International independent journals Chambers Global and Chambers Europe have acknowledged Hannes as an experienced and well-known attorney who “knows banking and finance throughout and is really helpful in advising clients on issues related to this subject”.

Hannes has made a number of presentations regarding the issues of commercial law, IT, international law, and human rights.

• Advising investing banks on conducting Estonia’s largest initial public offering (IPO) of shares (the privatization of Eesti Telekom, part of TeliaSonera Group, worth USD 221 million) and listing on the London and Tallinn Stock Exchange.
• Advising JPMorgan Chase and others involved on organising the EUR 2 billion bond program of Hansapank (now Swedbank). This is the largest-ever bond program in the Baltics to date.
• Advising Swedbank on making a takeover bid and on the takeover of shares belonging to minority shareholders and delisting of the bank’s shares on the stock exchange. The EUR 1.7 billion deal is the largest ever single transaction in the Baltics.
• Advising an international syndicate led by HypoVereinsbank (member of Unicredit) on a project worth EUR 100 million. Part of the project was aimed at financing a port development at the Port of Muuga by steel manufacturer Galvex (now ArcelorMittal). In its time, it was the largest Greenfield project in Estonia.

• Since 2016 Partner, law firm DERLING PRIMUS (firm name until September 2018 – DERLING)
• 2016 - 2019 President, Estonian Bar Association
• 2002 - 2016 Partner, law firm Tark Grunte Sutkiene
• 1999 - 2005 Guest Lecturer, University of Tartu, Faculty of Law
• 1996 - 2002 Associate, law firm Tark Grunte Sutkiene
• 1993 - 1996 Attaché, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Estonia, Legal Department

• University of Tartu, Master of Laws (cum laude) (2001)
• Academy of European Law, international program of criminal law (Trier, Germany), (2003 - 2005)
• Concordia University in Estonia, program of EU law (1997)
• University of Tartu, Bachelor of Laws, officially equivalent to MA (1996)
• University of Birmingham, training program about human rights (1994)

• American Society of International Law (since 2019)
• IBA Banking Committee officer (since 2009)
• Listing and Supervision Committee of the Tallinn Stock Exchange (since 2007)
• International Bar Association (IBA) (since 2007)
• Estonian Bar Association (since 1996)

• Ranked Lawyer (Band 1), Chambers Europe 2019
• Ranked Lawyer (Band 3), Chambers Global 2019
• Leading Individual, The Legal500 EMEA 2019
• Highly Regarded Lawyer, Financial and Corporate, IFLR1000 2019

• A book, co-authored by DERLING PRIMUS partners
• Over 50 publications on commercial law, financial law, technology, international law, human rights, and legal history
• He is a frequent speaker at conferences and seminars regarding law, technology and legal history. The topics he covers include banking and capital markets regulation, corporate governance, data protection, artificial intelligence, free speech, automation of the judiciary, etc.