Twelve months ago, the global legal community was reeling from the shock UK referendum result to leave the EU. Senior industry leaders shook their heads and predicted even more turbulent markets in what was already an uncertain global economy.
The gap between top US firms and the middle-tier masses continues to widen as pressure to secure top-decile talent intensifies. Can the chasing pack keep up with America’s elite?
‘The competition is frenetic in terms of attracting talent as is the competition in being retained on the most complex and sophisticated client mandates,’ notes Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison chair Brad Karp. ‘When you think of the continuum with commoditised work on one end and hyper-complex big-ticket work on the other, firms like ours try very hard to ensure that 90% of work is in that tiny zone at the end of the spectrum.’
Continue reading “The Global 100: The Zone – The US elite turns up the pressure”
Even before that, BLP had been through a factional election in 2015 which elevated employment specialist Lisa Mayhew as its new managing partner, while gripes over a disastrous run of partner hires on guaranteed pay deals several years previously have still not been forgotten.
High-stakes recruitment, financial pressures and Europe’s largest law firm collapse – here is a recap of the stories that defined the global legal market through the past 12 months. Continue reading “The Global 100 – The stories of the year”
DLA Piper, the world’s second-largest Swiss Verein-structured law firm, saw global turnover in 2016 drop 3% to $2.47bn from $2.54bn. The drop in overall revenue was attributed by the firm to exchange rate fluctuations across the global firm’s international business, which is divided between an international LLP and a US LLP. In sterling, DLA says, turnover was up 3%.
Similarly, Norton Rose Fulbright saw turnover drop 3% to $1.69bn, with the firm again attributing the performance to currency fluctuations. In a statement, a spokesperson said the firm had seen a 3% increase on 2015 revenue using like-for-like exchange rates, adding: ‘Our stated US dollar figures are very susceptible to currency exchange moves and, in the past year, the sterling, euro, Australian/Canadian dollars and South African rand experienced significant negative moves against the US dollar.’
With a listless economy, an oil and gas industry decimated by low commodity prices, and uncertainty over its future relationship with the EU and the rest of the UK, Scotland is lacking both clarity and optimism over its future.
