Nicholas Ridley is Counsel in the Firm’s Investment Funds Practice. Based in the Firm’s Washington, D.C. office, Nicholas focuses on complex regulatory and transactional matters including providing sponsor and adviser clients with practical and creative solutions to regulatory, compliance, and enforcement issues. Nicholas has extensive experience collaborating with clients to develop innovative retail products, pursue novel applications for SEC exemptive relief, and address emerging compliance and regulatory considerations impacting asset managers, private funds, registered funds, business development companies (BDCs), and fund boards. In addition, Nicholas frequently counsels both asset management and operating company clients on complicated “status” issues under the Investment Company Act. He has represented preeminent sponsors and investment managers such as AMG, Apollo, BC Partners, Blackstone, Carlyle, JPMorgan Asset Management, KKR, PIMCO, and SkyBridge Capital, among others.
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Work Highlights
Prior to rejoining the Firm, Nicholas served as in-house counsel at a global asset manager where he was principally responsible for legal, regulatory, and compliance affairs relating to $80 billion in client assets managed through domestic and offshore private funds, registered funds, UCITS funds, AIFs, and separately managed accounts.
Other historical representative work includes:
- Co-investment exemptive relief applications or interpretive advice to clients such as Apollo, BC Partners, Blackstone, Carlyle and others
- Representing operating companies including Lyft, Airbnb, Ant Group and others regarding investment company status in connection with both capital markets and credit transactions
- Structuring investments into asset management firms, including several investments by each of Affiliated Managers Group and Blackstone Strategic Capital Holdings
- Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company in its sale of OppenheimerFunds to Invesco
- BC Partners in the conversion of KCAP Financial, Inc., a publicly traded BDC, from an “internally-managed” BDC to an “externally-managed” BDC
Education
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George Washington University Law School, 2014 J.D. with Honors
Associate, The George Washington Law Review; Member, The George Washington Moot Court Board; Employment Director, The George Washington Black Law Students Association; Member, The National Association of Law Students with Disabilities
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University of Maryland, 2009 B.Sc. Cognitive Neuroscience
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University of Maryland, 2009 B.A. Philosophy
Admissions
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District of Columbia 2016
Languages Spoken
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English
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American Sign Language
Nicholas Ridley is Counsel in the Firm’s Investment Funds Practice. Based in the Firm’s Washington, D.C. office, Nicholas focuses on complex regulatory and transactional matters including providing sponsor and adviser clients with practical and creative solutions to regulatory, compliance, and enforcement issues. Nicholas has extensive experience collaborating with clients to develop innovative retail products, pursue novel applications for SEC exemptive relief, and address emerging compliance and regulatory considerations impacting asset managers, private funds, registered funds, business development companies (BDCs), and fund boards. In addition, Nicholas frequently counsels both asset management and operating company clients on complicated “status” issues under the Investment Company Act. He has represented preeminent sponsors and investment managers such as AMG, Apollo, BC Partners, Blackstone, Carlyle, JPMorgan Asset Management, KKR, PIMCO, and SkyBridge Capital, among others.
Nicholas began his career at the Firm. Prior to rejoining Simpson Thacher, Nicholas served as in-house counsel at a global asset manager where he was principally responsible for legal, regulatory, and compliance affairs relating to $80 billion in client assets managed through domestic and offshore private funds, registered funds, UCITS funds, AIFs, and separately managed accounts.
Historical representative examples of Nicholas’ work includes:
- Structuring investments into asset management firms, including several investments by each of Affiliated Managers Group and Blackstone Strategic Capital Holdings
- Counseling on co-investment exemptive relief applications and/or interpretive advice to clients such as Apollo, BC Partners, Blackstone, Carlyle and others
- Representing operating companies such as Lyft, Airbnb, Ant Group and others regarding investment company status in connection with both capital markets and credit transactions
- Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company in its sale of OppenheimerFunds to Invesco
- BC Partners in the conversion of KCAP Financial, Inc., a publicly traded BDC, from an “internally-managed” BDC to an “externally-managed” BDC
- KKR Real Estate Finance Trust Inc. (KREF) in offerings of common stock and convertible senior notes
Nicholas received his J.D. from The George Washington Law School in 2014 with Honors where he was an Associate of The George Washington Law Review, Member of The George Washington Moot Court Board, Employment Director of The George Washington Black Law Students Association, and Member of The National Association of Law Students with Disabilities. He received his B.S. in Neuroscience and B.A. in Philosophy from University of Maryland, College Park in 2009. Nicholas is admitted to practice in the District of Columbia.