Sheldon E. Hochberg

Partner

1330 Connecticut Avenue, NW
Washington DC 20036
TEL: 202.429.6218
FAX: 202.429.3902

Sheldon E. Hochberg joined the Washington office of Steptoe & Johnson LLP as a partner in 1991, where he was a member of the International Department. He has significant experience in international and administrative law. Prior to that time, he had been a partner with a well known Washington firm since 1975 and had earlier served as an attorney-adviser with the Office of the Legal Adviser for Economic Affairs of the US Department of State.

International Law
Mr. Hochberg has extensive experience in international arbitrations and international trade. While at the Department of State, he worked on international trade and commodity issues and represented the United States in an arbitration against Brazil under the International Coffee Agreement. From 1983 through 1987, he represented a major oil company in an ad hoc arbitration in Paris against the Secretary of Petroleum of Libya and the Libyan Government that involved claims of expropriation and breach of contract in connection with the company's former concessions in that country, and various tax and oil field practice counterclaims.

Since joining Steptoe & Johnson LLP, Mr. Hochberg has been actively involved in international trade and countervailing duty matters. He participated in the Canadian softwood lumber proceeding, and since 1992 has handled two major steel cases that involved a number of cutting-edge countervail issues, including the effects of the privatization of a company or its productive facilities on the countervailability of pre-privatization subsidies and methodologies for the treatment of capital subsidies. In connection with these representations, Mr. Hochberg played a lead role in the oral arguments in these cases at the Department of Commerce and before the Court of International Trade and the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.

Administrative Law
Mr. Hochberg has been actively involved in administrative and legislative matters throughout his career and has written on the standards for judicial review of agency decisions.

For over twenty years, he has represented national and state trade associations and individual insurers in the title insurance industry on a wide variety of federal and state regulatory, legislative and litigation matters. These matters have included issues relating to the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA), bank involvement in the insurance agency and underwriting business, Indian land claims, antitrust litigation involving rating bureaus and when products or services constitute insurance. Mr. Hochberg was lead counsel in litigation in the DC and Second Circuits involving national bank and bank holding company activities in the insurance area. He is a frequent speaker at insurance industry and bar association seminars on RESPA, controlled business, and banking and insurance issues.

Mr. Hochberg has also advised insurance trade associations and service organizations on matters relating to the operation of industry databases, the provision of reference information on agents and employees, the Fair Credit Reporting Act and the law of privacy.

Mr. Hochberg has been involved in rulemaking and informal adjudicative proceedings involving the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Federal Reserve Board, the FDIC, the Federal Trade Commission and other federal agencies. He has also provided counsel in several major legislative initiatives, including legislation to reverse Supreme Court decisions in the antitrust area, real estate and banking legislation, Indian land claims legislation and legislation to reorganize the Penn Central.

Noteworthy & Success Stories

Ranked, Chambers Global 2007, The World's Leading Lawyers for Business, WTO/International Trade: USA: Trade Remedies & Trade Policy
Ranked, Chambers USA 2005 and 2006, America's Leading Business Lawyers; National International Trade
Canadian Wheat and Lumber Have Two Further Victories
Steptoe Wins in DC Circuit Court for ABA

News, Seminars & Events

Publications & Speaking Engagements

HUD'S RESPA Regulations: The Proposals, The Comments, The Future
February 12, 2003