Life is increasingly complex for top Dublin lawyers these days. Particularly when your personal business interests coincide with your professional activities and vice versa.
Arthur Cox partner and Jefferson Smurfit director James O'Dwyer has been excluded from considering Madison Dearborn Partners' (MDP) €3.7 billion bid for Smurfit because Arthur Cox are MDP's lawyers. The good news is that he is not missing out on any additional fees because Mr Martin Rafferty, the chairman of the independent subcommittee, decided they would not be appropriate, even though the independent directors have had to put in a considerable amount of extra work.
In fact, Mr O'Dwyer is probably better off being excluded as he is personally advising MDP on Irish law, according to Legal Week magazine and no doubt is being handsomely rewarded. He also gets to cash out his 60,000-odd Smurfit shares at the takeover price.
Meanwhile, down the road from Cox's at William Fry, Houghton Fry was less fortunate. He is advising on the Merrill Lynch-backed takeover of Green Property and, presumably in order to avoid any possible conflict of interest, he sold his 8,000 odd Green shares at €6.60 a share a few months ago. As a consequence, he misses out on a bigger pay day if the Merrill Lynch/HBOS/Stephen Vernon buyout of the company goes ahead at €9.80 per share.
No doubt, Mr Fry and Mr O'Dwyer will have the opportunity to commiserate with one another as Mr O'Dwyer is advising the Green board.
They might also spare a thought for poor old Ray MacSharry, who is earning a cool €200,000 in extra fees at Green - where he is chairman - for the additional work involved in the takeover negotiations. Down at Smurfit - where he is one of the independent directors - he gets nothing for doing something similar under Mr Rafferty.
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