Spear’s Review

Xavier Nicholas is a partner and head of private clients at Forsters in London, leading an impressive team on matters around personal taxation, succession planning, trusts and family governance.

His practice is international, with clients including UK/US families and individuals who wish to come to the UK; he assists with planning for potential residents and UK resident non-doms. He has considerable experience of and skill in establishing wealth-holding structures such as trusts, companies and partnerships for assets and wealth held in the UK and other jurisdictions.

Forsters’ private client department is award-winning, and Nicholas is frequently quoted in the national and legal press on taxation, wealth and succession issues in the UK and abroad. He trained and spent the first four years of his career at Macfarlanes, and joined Forsters in 2009.

Adviser Profile

Xavier leads Forsters’ award-winning private client practice, which has been acclaimed by STEP as the ‘Private Client Legal Team of the Year’ for two consecutive years.

With over two decades of experience, Xavier advises individuals, families, trustees and family offices in the UK and internationally on personal taxation, trust and estate planning, and family governance (including family charters and constitutions). He is a trusted adviser to wealthy international families, particularly those with business interests, drawing on the talents of the firm’s corporate lawyers and leading bench of cross-practice private client expertise in jurisdictions from Asia and the Middle East, to Europe and the US.

Alongside a renowned team of industry leaders at Forsters, Xavier is experienced in advising families where there is a present or future risk of conflict, working in tandem with the firm’s private client disputes team.

Beyond his work for clients based across locations including – amongst others – Monaco, Dubai, Singapore and Hong Kong, Xavier frequently advises clients who have a US connection, both on the UK aspects of US/UK estate planning, and the interaction between UK and US taxes. His cross-jurisdictional work is key to the firm’s international strategy, drawing together different areas of the firm (e.g. real estate, family and immigration).

Xavier is praised as being ‘technically excellent’, ‘commercially astute’, and having a ‘good bedside manner’ – three central attributes of an outstanding private client lawyer. Recognised as a Spear’s Top Recommended adviser, Xavier is also one of eprivateclient’s ‘50 Most Influential’ private client professionals, named as one of Legal Week’s Private Client Global Elite and ranked as a Legal 500 ‘Leading Partner’.