O’Melveny Welcomes Leading Structured Finance and CLO Duo: Howard Goldwasser and Skanthan Vivekananda
June 2, 2025
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
NEW YORK—June 2, 2025—O’Melveny announced today that a duo of leading structured finance and securitization specialists—Howard Goldwasser and Skanthan Vivekananda—have joined the firm’s New York and Los Angeles offices as partners in the Corporate Finance Practice Group.
Goldwasser and Vivekananda, who have worked together for nearly 15 years, have built one of the market’s top structured finance and collateralized loan obligation (CLO) practices, representing arrangers, lenders, asset managers, sponsors, investors, and rating agencies in CLOs and other complex structured financings. They bring a long track record of innovation in the space, pioneering “CLO 2.0” transactions in the wake of the 2008-09 financial crisis and structuring deals across a wide array of traditional and esoteric asset classes, including: credit cards and consumer loans; trade, telecom, and energy-related receivables; repo-backed note issuances; and music and pharmaceutical royalties.
The duo come to O’Melveny from the New York and Los Angeles offices of Orrick, where they practiced together in that firm’s Structured Finance Group. Their arrival bolsters O’Melveny’s rapidly expanding Corporate Finance Practice, which has grown from three to 16 partners in just five years. And the firm’s broad finance platform now comprises award-winning capabilities in aviation, energy, infrastructure, music and entertainment, and real estate finance, as well as private credit and bank finance.
“Continuing to expand our finance offerings is a key priority for our firm, and we are delighted to welcome Howard and Skanthan to the team,” said O’Melveny chair Bradley J. Butwin. “They are tremendously creative, innovative, and respected lawyers with a track record of creating novel transaction structures for an array of sophisticated clients. Our bank and financial services clients, in particular, will be well served by Howard’s and Skanthan’s structured finance and securitization experience. It is a pleasure to welcome them aboard.”
“We’re confident that O’Melveny will be a great fit for our practice and our clients,” said Goldwasser. “We were impressed by the firm’s demonstrated commitment to developing a strong, broad-based finance offering, with an increasingly robust, end-to-end credit platform. We’re excited to bring our expertise and experience to the fast-growing O’Melveny team, and to provide our clients with all of O’Melveny’s signature, industry-leading benefits.”
“O’Melveny’s distinctive culture was another draw for us,” added Vivekananda. “We were impressed by the firm’s cross-practice integration, as well as the partners’ genuine focus on collegiality and collaboration across offices and platforms. We’re delighted to call O’Melveny our new professional ‘home.’”
The addition of Goldwasser and Vivekananda accelerates O’Melveny’s continued strategic growth, with 38 lateral partners joining the firm since 2023—including 23 corporate partners based in the firm’s New York, Los Angeles, Century City, Dallas, Houston, Singapore, and London offices.
About the Duo
Based in New York, Howard Goldwasser is ranked among the nation’s premier securitization lawyers by Chambers USA and the Legal 500 US. For more than three decades, he has advised many of the most active participants in the securitization arena on a broad range of structured finance securitization transactions of both traditional and non-traditional asset classes, including CLOs and CDOs, fintech assets, and covered bonds, as well as receivables from credit cards, consumer loans, airline tickets, pharmaceutical royalties, and music royalties.
Goldwasser earned his J.D. from Columbia Law School and his B.A. magna cum laude from New York University.
Based in Los Angeles, Skanthan Vivekananda has more than 20 years of experience advising clients on structured finance, derivatives, and investment management. He focuses his practice on the formation and structuring of cash and synthetic CLOs and other securitization vehicles, as well as other credit-focused investment funds. He is ranked among the leading securitization lawyers in the US by Chambers USA.
Vivekananda earned his J.D. cum laude from the University of Michigan Law School and his B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley.