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Global London 2024: Back down to earth
When the going gets tough – Global London firms dig in as market reality bites
With worldwide M&A activity down 17% last year, hitting a decade low, according to data from Refinitiv, 2023 was always going to be a more challenging year for US firms in London. And across the board, growth slowed as firms bucked the ‘stack ‘em high’ trend of recent years, exercising an increasingly cautious approach to investment and recruitment in the capital.
During 2023, total London lawyer headcount across the Global London group (see main table) increased by a mere 1.8%, a significant decrease from last year’s equivalent figure of 9% and far below the pre-pandemic era, which saw 15% growth at Global London firms between 2017 and 2018. Continue reading “When the going gets tough – Global London firms dig in as market reality bites”
Market forces: Paul Weiss, Kirkland and the war for London talent
In the contest for the biggest legal story of the moment, the A&O Shearman merger may be more transformational for the firms involved, but it is fair to say it has not quite captured the imagination like Paul Weiss’s dramatic and audacious hiring spree in London.
‘The question is whether a firm can genuinely build an elite PE practice by lifting out the top guys from different shops,’ muses one US firm partner, on Paul Weiss’s bid to crack London. Continue reading “Market forces: Paul Weiss, Kirkland and the war for London talent”
The energy and renewables debate: Power shifts
Eric Knai, Eversheds Sutherland: If you look back at 2023, we have had a very depressed M&A market other than in the energy sector. If you think about the two geopolitical events that have dominated 2023, the Ukraine war and the conflict in the Middle East towards the end of the year, those are both conflicts which are in oil and gas regions and which have impacted not only production but also supply chain.
Why does that impact M&A, transactional work and projects in general? It has driven up interest rates as a result of the inflation that those crises have created. But my view is that the issues with the M&A market in 2023 do not have much to do with the level of interest rates. Most of us around this table are old enough to remember doing deals at 6%, 7%, 8% or 9%.
Continue reading “The energy and renewables debate: Power shifts”
Legal Business Corporate and M&A Summit 2024
More than 150 of the City’s leading M&A partners, in-house counsel and representatives from corporates and financial institutions came together in mid-March to discuss the latest trends in M&A at the 2024 Legal Business Corporate and M&A Summit.
The event, held at the Queen Elizabeth II Conference Centre in Westminster and sponsored by Gibson Dunn, Datasite, Gate One, Jones Day, Moneypenny, Shieldpay, Stevens & Bolton and Slaughter and May, saw delegates talk through the life cycle of an M&A deal over the course of a single day.
Continue reading “Legal Business Corporate and M&A Summit 2024”
Pace-setters: how the fastest-growing Global London firms are rising up the L500 rankings
Despite growth slowing amid a stuttering deal market in 2023, the Global London law firms have cut a swathe through the City over recent years, with their purchasing power enabling them to consistently acquire market share in London.
The Legal 500 rankings offer detailed insight into the scale and focus of this growth – as a group, the Global London firms have increased their number of top-tier Legal 500 rankings by almost 40% over the past five years – a stark comparison to the Magic Circle, where tier one rankings have remained flat. Continue reading “Pace-setters: how the fastest-growing Global London firms are rising up the L500 rankings”
Global London 2024 main table
Disputes Yearbook 2024 – Best case scenarios
Holding court – cases of the year
If any trend is set to define the London disputes market in 2024, it is the continued rise of group litigation. A vast array of mass claims are winding their way through the courts, spurred on by an increased willingness to adapt to the challenges of case management, heightened awareness of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues on the parts of corporates and the general public, the maturing of the claimant Bar, and the development of the Competition Appeals Tribunal (CAT) regime – including the rise of the first opt-out class actions.
The comprehensive failure of ClientEarth’s derivative claim against Shell has not slowed activity in the environmental space. In addition to the upcoming decision in the major Municipio de Mariana & Ors v BHP Group, a number of other group actions are brewing, with Leigh Day among the firms leading the charge. The firm is bringing a claim on behalf of more than 11,000 claimants from Nigeria’s Ogale and Bille communities, alleging that oil spills from Shell pipelines have caused long-term contamination of claimants’ land and water. Judgment is awaited in a petition to further expand the claim to address questions about the right to a clean environment. Continue reading “Holding court – cases of the year”
Scaling up: a look back at the last ten years of disputes in London
When Legal Business first launched its Disputes Yearbook back in 2014 Brexit was barely on the radar, most people had not heard of Wuhan and post-financial crisis disputes work and oligarchs were helping firms cast aside any doubts about how sustainable further disputes growth was at either the biggest players in the City or the boutiques spinning out from them.
While much has changed, many of the key market players are still the same today and some of the bigger trends keeping litigators busy now were still evident a decade ago – albeit in nascent form. Continue reading “Scaling up: a look back at the last ten years of disputes in London”