E. Carolan Berkley Esq.

Stradley Ronon Stevens & Young, LLP
Berkley, E. Carolan

E. Carolan Berkley is a Partner in the Philadelphia office of Stradley Ronon Stevens & Young, LLP where she concentrates her practice in the areas of investment management, derivatives, finance, secured transactions, general corporate law and opinion. Ms. Berkley represents investment management companies, open-end and closed-end investment companies, and registered advisers in a range of matters.

Ms. Berkley provides regulatory, compliance and business advice, including on disclosure, compliance policies and reports, liquidity and leveraged loans, interfund and securities lending, financing distribution costs, on and off balance sheets, derivatives, statutory trust issues and director’s duties. She also represents business corporations and alternative entities in a variety of matters, including formation, reorganizations, domestic and international private business acquisitions, secured and unsecured loans, derivatives, securitizations and general business advice.

Ms. Berkley is an active member of a number of committees of the American Bar Association Business Law Section. Ms. Berkley has worked on American Bar Association, Pennsylvania Bar Association and TriBar Opinion Committee projects on legal opinions. She served as a member of the drafting group for the Pennsylvania Legal Opinion Deskbook and co-reporter for the ABA report on Closing Opinions of Inside Counsel. Ms. Berkley is also a frequent lecturer on advisor and mutual fund compliance and opinion practice issues. She earned her B.S., cum laude, from Tufts University and her J.D., magna cum laude, from Temple University.

She is the author of Bloomberg BNA Corporate Practice Portfolio SeriesThird Party Legal Opinions.  This portfolio volume discusses legal opinions in letter form that are addressed to someone other than the lawyer's client. The receipt of such an opinion letter, in a previously agreed upon form, by a third party, is frequently a condition of closing a commercial transaction of a magnitude justifying the expense. The purposes and typical structure of the opinion letter are explained, as are some of the standard paragraphs that appear in such opinion letters.