Herbert Smith Freehills, Hogan Lovells and Maclay Murray & Spens have landed the top legal roles on Lloyds Banking Group's sale of Scottish Widows Investment Partnership Group (SWIP) to Aberdeen Asset Management.

The deal is valued at £650m, with Aberdeen paying £550m in shares and bolting on an additional performance-related five year earn-out payment of up to £100 million.

HSF advised Lloyds on the acquisition documents with a team led by corporate partner James Palmer, while Hogan Lovells corporate partner Rachel Kent advised the banking group on operational aspects.

Maclay Murray advised Aberdeen Asset Management on the acquisition which includes SWIP's private equity and infrastructure fund businesses. Corporate finance partner Guy Norfolk led the team along with partners Andy Lowe and Nick Rutter.

Norfolk said: "The transaction involved a complex, multi-layered structure, involving three distinct, but inter-related, and each very important, work-streams: the acquisition; long-term commercial contracts; and migration of the SWIP business to Aberdeen."

The deal is expected to complete in the first quarter of 2014 and will make Aberdeen the largest listed fund manager in Europe. As part of the deal Aberdeen will enter into a long-term strategic partnership managing assets across its wealth, insurance, commercial banking and retail businesses.

HSF and Hogan Lovells missed out on a place on Lloyds' new legal panel,which was announced last year. But the setback has not stopped the firms winning mandates from the bank.

In May, Hogan Lovells acted for Lloyds on a deal which saw Sainsbury's purchase the remaining 50% of shares from the bank for £248m.

Aberdeen is a long standing client of Maclay's, with the firm acting on a number of acquisitions, including the Deutsche and Credit Suisse deals.