It was a double celebration for Shearman & Sterling and more than 75 clients and friends of the firm: the firm unveiled its new office space, located in the heart of Frankfurt’s financial district, and hosted a special evening reception, with Joseph E. Stiglitz, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, as keynote speaker. The reception was held at the new office, a state-of-the-art facility located on the 13th and 14th floors of the Frankfurt OpernTurm.

View a video of the evening celebration, with key highlights from Prof. Stiglitz’s speech:

Introductory and welcome comments from Shearman & Sterling’s senior partner, Creighton Condon, and Frankfurt office managing partner Thomas König, kicked off the evening.

“It was wonderful to welcome our guests to our beautiful new office space,” König said. “The evening’s mood was quite positive—a result of the increasing confidence that new challenges will also create new opportunities in Germany and throughout much of Europe. We all toasted to an optimistic future.”

In introducing Prof. Stiglitz, a professor at Columbia University, prior to his presentation on the future of the euro currency union, Condon noted that Prof. Stiglitz was also one of the lead authors of the 1995 Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007. He served as Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under the Clinton administration as well as Chief Economist and Senior Vice President of the World Bank from 1997 to 2000. In 2011, TIME Magazine named him among the 100 most influential people in the world.

Said König, “The world is changing faster than before, and we all have to look for new solutions. Professor Stiglitz has throughout his career been looking for answers and solutions to new and unprecedented challenges.”