Lourdes Catrain

Lourdes Catrain's practice focuses on international trade law and policy, including market access and regulatory matters involving economic sanctions, export control, customs, and environmental and competition law issues relating to trade. She has been consistently recognized as a leading practitioner in the international trade arena by Chambers Europe/Global, Legal 500 EMEA, Who’s Who Legal, and Law360.

Lourdes has helped governments and industry secure EU market access by navigating free trade and investment negotiations, sanctions and export control, investment control, tariff and non-tariff barriers, and related advocacy before the EU institutions. Moreover, she has successfully represented clients in trade remedies cases and in litigation before the European Court of Justice. She also advises on WTO-compatibility of EU and third-country trade and other regulatory measures which impact trade (e.g., technical trade barriers). Lourdes has experience advising clients in a broad range of industries and services, including: life sciences, agricultural, chemicals, electronics, steel, financial services, textiles and general consumer goods sectors.

Lourdes is part of Hogan Lovells' Brexit Strategy Group; she's regularly called to help navigate UK-based as well as EU-27 and non-EU corporates on the trade implications of the UK departure from the EU.      

She has achieved milestone successes for clients on all areas of international trade law and economic sanctions. These include: the completion on behalf of a sovereign government of FTA negotiations with the EU; judicial delisting of an entity from the EU Iran Sanctions; the termination of an anti-subsidy investigation on behalf of the Government of Indonesia; a series of voluntary disclosures in various EU jurisdictions on breaches of economic sanctions and export control laws; advice on a customs valuation which resulted in the continued reliance on the favourable first sale rule for a large life sciences global company. In the EU's largest trade dispute with China, solar panels, she represents the interests of a key EU upstream supplier which forcefully opposes the continuation of measures against imports from China. Lourdes also led the foreign investment filings related to EUR 12.3bn acquisition by GE of Alstom's energy activities.