BakerHostetler announced today the launch of its Crypto Asset Disputes team, a dedicated team focused on litigation and arbitration involving crypto assets, blockchain technology and emerging digital markets.

Born out of the firm’s existing Chambers-ranked Web3 and Digital Assets team, which launched in 2018, this new team formalizes and expands the firm’s long-standing work in complex litigation at the intersection of digital assets, disputes and market infrastructure. BakerHostetler is the first Am Law 100 firm to establish a dedicated Crypto Asset Disputes team.

The team will be led by New York partner Joanna F. Wasick, a seasoned litigator and founding member of the firm’s Web3 and Digital Assets team. “Crypto disputes are no longer an emerging issue; they are a core business risk for market participants across the digital asset ecosystem,” Wasick said. “BakerHostetler has been litigating and arbitrating crypto asset disputes for years, across commercial, regulatory, insolvency and enforcement matters. This team provides a formal platform for those capabilities and brings together BakerHostetler’s deep litigation bench, technical fluency and practical experience in digital assets to help clients navigate disputes that often move quickly, cross borders and involve novel questions of law and technology.”

The Crypto Asset Disputes team targets matters involving commercial and tort disputes, securities and commodities litigation, government investigations and enforcement actions, asset tracing and recovery, bankruptcy-related disputes, cross-border proceedings, and other matters arising from blockchain-enabled business models and transactions.

Ted Kobus, who leads the firm’s Digital Assets and Data Management Practice Group, said the new Crypto Asset Disputes team marks another step forward in BakerHostetler’s dedication to being at the center of legal issues involving the data life cycle, which includes crypto assets. “Simply understanding cryptocurrency is not enough. Clients need advisers who understand how digital assets intersect with data, technology, regulation and enterprise risk. These teams bring those capabilities together under one roof, allowing us to provide practical, business-focused counsel from prevention through resolution.”

The firm also announced that Isabelle Corbett Sterling will lead its Digital and Innovative Markets team, which she helped launch. It was the first team of its kind at an Am Law 100 firm and focuses on the convergence of traditional financial services, digital assets and other emerging financial technologies. The team advises market participants on regulatory, enforcement, product development, transactional and market structure issues involving traditional and innovative financial products and platforms.

“Digital assets are increasingly intertwined with traditional financial markets, as clients frequently operate in both. Clients need counsel who understand both the technology and the regulatory architecture that govern financial markets,” Corbett Sterling said. “The Digital and Innovative Markets team is built to help clients develop, evaluate, adopt and defend traditional and innovative market structures and products while navigating a fast-changing legal and regulatory environment.”

BakerHostetler’s Crypto Asset Disputes and Digital and Innovative Markets teams will be fully integrated with the firm’s nationally recognized Web3 and Digital Assets team, led by BakerHostetler Partner Robert A. Musiala Jr. “Our Web3 and Digital Assets team has grown and evolved alongside the market from its earliest stages,” Musiala said. “The launch of the Crypto Asset Disputes team and the continued development of the Digital and Innovative Markets team reflect BakerHostetler’s continued commitment to investing in and expanding in step with new technologies to support clients across the full digital asset life cycle.”

Comprising more than 100 attorneys and technologists, BakerHostetler’s Digital Assets and Data Management Practice Group unites key service offerings and technologies intersecting with the life cycle of data. The group is a globally recognized leader whose roster includes attorneys practicing in this space for more than two decades, former federal prosecutors, veteran in-house counsel and past government agency leaders. With more than 10 top-tier rankings by Chambers USA and Legal 500, the DADM Practice Group is considered a go-to firm for cybersecurity, privacy, advertising, data governance and emerging technologies.

For more information, visit bakerlaw.com/DigitalAssetsDataManagement. Connect with us on LinkedIn at @BakerHostetler, @TedKobus, @JoannaWasick, @IsabelleCorbettSterling or @Rob Musiala or on X at @BakerHostetler.

About BakerHostetler

BakerHostetler helps clients around the world address their most complex and critical business and regulatory issues. Our highly ranked attorneys deliver sophisticated counsel and outstanding client service. We have six core practice groups – Business, Digital Assets and Data Management, Intellectual Property, Labor and Employment, Litigation, and Tax – and more than 1,000 lawyers coast to coast. For more information, visit bakerlaw.com.

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