The international law firm Withers has continued to build out its tax team with the appointment of Kristin Konschnik as international partner in London.

Konschnik, who was latterly a senior associate with Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt and Mosle, spent four years training at and working for Withers in New Haven and London earlier in her career. Konschnik’s practice is focused on cross-border transactions, insolvency and restructuring, M&A, private equity and hedge fund structures and financings, and she has represented several clients brought before the US tax authorities.

Withers, along with many other law and advisory firms, has been ramping up its US tax expertise due to the impact sweeping regulatory changes will have on both international private clients and corporates. Legislation such as the Dodd-Frank and FATCA acts threaten to greatly increase the complexity of tax compliance for US taxpayers, with a consequence that a number of banks have ceased to provide offshore financial services to such clients, due, not least, to rising compliance costs.

In related news, in April Withers is to open a second Swiss office in Zurich to advise private and institutional clients in areas including cross-border personal and corporate tax planning, US-specific tax compliance, structuring and succession planning, and trusts.