A quantitative practice for people whose decisions move the number. We connect technical tax analysis to the dollars, timing, and trade-offs that drive the decision, and where the answer turns on economics we pair the advice with a model that makes the consequences clear.
La Presa is led by Carlos A. Schmidt, MBT, MBA, CPA, former Partner and Global Head of Tax at Ares Management, where he built the tax function from three people to more than forty and structured the firm's IPO, its Up-C and tax receivable agreement, and its conversion to a C corporation. Before Ares he was a tax partner at Ernst & Young and at Deloitte's National Tax Office and Tax Director at Highbridge Capital Management. You work directly with the adviser responsible for your analysis.
Tax adviser on a $325 million capital solution for Authentic Restaurant Brands, a Garnett Station Partners portfolio company (September 2026).
Advised on the strategic minority investment by Dai-ichi Life and its $1.3 billion commitment to Canyon-managed funds.
Client names appear with permission. Earlier work at Ares is described separately on the About page.
Fund sponsors negotiating a continuation vehicle. Family offices deciding how to hold a stake. Individuals with more at risk in a single tax year than most firms see in a decade. Different seats, same question: what does this structure cost after tax, and can someone show me?
We can. We build the model alongside the memo, and the two agree before either leaves the building: basis, liabilities, allocations, rates, timing, and the judgment calls that sit on top of them.
When a matter has six advisers on it, we help counsel, accountants, and bankers keep the tax analysis and the transaction economics aligned, an agreed quarterback role, and we bring the creative structure when the obvious one does not work.
Feeders, parallels, SMAs, and leveraged blockers, with the ECI, withholding, and §163(j) arithmetic run rather than assumed.
Manager M&A, continuation funds, Up-C IPOs, and tax receivable agreements, with the gain computed before anyone signs.
Reasoned opinions at a stated level of comfort, technical memoranda, and private letter ruling requests.
Entity and trust design, PTET and multi-state planning, QSBS, Opportunity Zones, and the after-tax comparison of the choices in front of you.
ITC structuring, §6418 credit transfers, and tax-equity flips for developers and the investors funding them.
After-tax return comparisons, waterfalls, and basis roll-forwards built to committee standard, and the tax metrics a CFO should watch.
IRS examinations, appeals, and settlements: partnership audits, estate tax examinations, §382 disputes, and positions the examiner has never seen before.
A position we cannot model is a position we do not yet understand.
La Presa Partners served as tax adviser to Trimontium on a bespoke $325 million package of debt, hybrid, and equity instruments for Authentic Restaurant Brands, a portfolio company of Garnett Station Partners.
What the cashing-out LP, the rolling LP, and the new money each give up when a sponsor moves a company into a continuation vehicle, with the basis and liability arithmetic laid out step by step.
Which tax metrics predict after-tax returns, which merely describe last year, and how selection bias, marks, and fee resets distort the comparisons most decks rely on.