James A. Baker IV chairs the firmwide Global Projects Department of Baker Botts, and serves on the firm’s executive committee. Additionally, Mr. Baker serves as international partner, responsible for the development and coordination of the firm’s international practice through its various offices.

Mr. Baker’s practice concentrates on domestic and international commercial and trade-related matters and transactions. His transactional practice principally involves the energy and natural resources and technology sectors of the economy and involves contract negotiation and documentation of investment vehicles, business combinations, divestitures and operations and various forms of corporate and project finance.

Mr. Baker’s clients include both foreign and domestic publicly traded and closely held companies and investment funds and partnerships, and he regularly advises clients in both inbound and outbound international investments. He has worked on transactions in the Arabian peninsula and North Africa, Central and East Asia, Europe and Russia, many of which have involved negotiations between private concerns and government agencies or state enterprises.

Additionally, Mr. Baker regularly advises clients regarding their compliance obligations under U.S. trade and transactional regulations, including U.S. sanctions programs, export controls, the Exon-Florio amendments to the Defense Production Act and the associated CFIUS review process, and other U.S. laws affecting foreign investment.

From 1982 to 1985, Mr. Baker served as counsel to the U.S. Senate Majority Leader. He is currently co-chairman of the U.S.-Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce, and he serves on the board of Blackstreet Capital, a Washington-based investment firm. He also serves on the advisory board of the Baker Institute at RiceUniversity in Houston, as well as on the Board of Directors of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, a national conservation organization based in Washington, D.C.

Representative Engagements

Barrick Gold Corporation – sale of 50% interest in the Jabal Sayid copper mine in the Western Province of Saudi Arabia (project value of $420 million) to the Saudi Arabian national mining company (Ma’aden)

Ivanhoe Mines Ltd. – development of the $4.5 billion Oyu Tolgoi copper/gold mining project in the South Gobi region of Mongolia, including negotiation of a stability agreement with the government of Mongolia and advice concerning various investment treaty considerations

Interros Holdings – advised the $9.5 billion Moscow-based investment firm in the creation of IST Capital, a $2 billion private equity fund in which Interros was anchor investor and in the subsequent creation of Altpoint Capital

Petrochemical Industries Company (K.S.C.), a subsidiary of Kuwait Petroleum – representation in its negotiations of a proposed multi-billion dollar joint venture with Dow Chemical combining the companies’ plastics

Hyundai Motor Company – representation in the siting and construction of its first U.S.-based production facility in Montgomery, Alabama, a factory that currently manufactures 300,000 vehicles annually

Norilsk Nickel – representation of the Russian mining giant in its landmark acquisition of a controlling interest in Stillwater Mining, a U.S.-based publicly traded (NYSE) mining company, the first such acquisition by a Russian company

Aventis – successor to the merger of Rhone Poulenc and Hoechst and a major European pharmaceutical manufacturer – postmerger counsel in the divestment of various non-core businesses