Paul B. Benham III, Attorney

Paul Benham joined the firm in 1972 following a year in which he was the law clerk for Carleton Harris, Chief Justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court. He immediately began a corporate finance practice representing banks and other secured lenders. In the early 1980s, he undertook the representation of clients such as Arkansas Power & Light Company (now, Entergy Arkansas, Inc.), Dillard Department Stores, Inc., (now, Dillard's, Inc.) and First Commercial Bancshares, Inc. (now, Regions Bank) in a corporate finance and mergers and acquisition practice that requires expertise in federal and state securities laws. He also began a municipal bond practice, focusing primarily on industrial development revenue bond financings. In addition, he presently advises Union Pacific Railroad with respect to regulatory matters in the State of Arkansas. His finance practice has involved initial, primary and secondary public offerings of equity and debt securities and of hybrid securities such as junior subordinated deferrable interest debentures, collateralized pollution control revenue bonds, subordinated trust preferred securities, and leveraged and synthetic leases. He has also represented both lenders and borrowers in sophisticated, non-traditional, project financings. He represented the Arkansas State Highway Commission in the Arkansas GARVEE Bond Program, a unique combination of federal and state funds more than $650 million for interstate highway repair and resurfacing.