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  • March 19, 2009 |

    Skadden in City arbitration lateral hire

    Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom has secured a rare lateral partner hire in London, with arbitration partner David Kavanagh set to join from O'Melveny & Myers. Kavanagh, who is currently co-head of O'Melveny'sLondon litigation practice, will join Skadden along with a team of three associates. His move comes fewer than two years after he joined the West Coast firm with fellow partner David Foster from Watson Farley & Williams in June 2007.

    1 minute read

  • March 18, 2009 |

    Management: Betting on the big four

    The big four magic circle firms (Allen & Overy, Clifford Chance, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, Linklaters) have had an incredible run over the past 15 years. All of them achieved the benchmark of extraordinary success for a large law firm - profits per equity partner (PEP) near or over $2m (£1.4m) and gross revenues of around $2bn (£1.4bn). What made their success all the more impressive was that in the early 1990s their standing was less than 'magical' relative to premier US firms. As much as these firms achieved over these last 15 years, the current economic crisis raises real questions about how they will fare in the future.

    1 minute read

  • March 18, 2009 |

    China blocks Coke deal; Skadden and Freshfields advise

    In one of the first major tests of China's recently-adopted antitrust law, the country's government has rejected a $2.4bn (£1.7bn) bid by Coca-Cola to acquire Chinese beverage maker Huiyuan Juice Group. If it had been permitted to proceed, the deal would have been the largest-ever takeover of a Chinese company by a multinational. The closely-watched deal saw Coca-Cola represented by Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom, whose team was led by Nicholas Norris in Hong Kong and Gregory Miao in Shanghai. Huiyuan instructed Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer.China's Anti-Monopoly Law came into affect in August 2008. Broadly modelled on Western competition laws, the measure also takes into account proposed mergers' impact on "national economic development".

    1 minute read

  • March 16, 2009 |

    CC re-elects Medwick as Americas chief

    Clifford Chance (CC) has re-elected Craig Medwick as regional managing partner for the firm's Americas practice. Medwick (pictured), who is also a member of the firm's global management committee, will now take up a second four-year term in the role. He has been a partner with CC since 1987 and his practice focuses on corporate and securities transactions.The role as Americas head involves overseeing CC's offices in New York, Sao Paulo and Washington DC.

    1 minute read

  • March 4, 2009 |

    Through the wire

    The series of US criminal prosecutions of online gaming companies during the last three years can be seen as the inevitable result of the wishful thinking surrounding two widely-held misperceptions about the reach of US laws. The first of these was the belief that US anti-gambling laws applied only to persons who were physically present within US borders. The second was the expectation that US prosecutors could not bring prosecutions against online gaming operators because for a period of years they had not. Both of these misperceptions have been unambiguously resolved by the recent actions of the US Department of Justice (DoJ). Two further questions about the reach of US laws have proven more stubborn, though. The first lingering question relates to the scope of the Wire Act, the federal statute that makes it illegal to engage "in the business of betting or wagering... on any sporting event or contest" using wire communications. The DoJ has consistently taken the view that the Wire Act applies broadly to betting or wagering on all forms of gambling, including sports betting and poker. By contrast, in In Re MasterCard International [2002], the only US appellate court that has considered the scope of the Wire Act held that the statute is narrowly drawn and applies only to sports betting. This difference of opinion remains important particularly because the DoJ interprets the Wire Act to apply to any gambling business engaged in "betting or wagering" using wire communications. If the contrary view - that the Wire Act applies only to sports betting - is correct, then illegal gambling includes only a more narrow group of activities that are defined to be illegal under the laws of individual states.

    1 minute read

  • March 3, 2009 |

    Debevoise reports 7.2% revenue increase for 2008

    Debevoise & Plimpton has reported a 7.2% increase in revenues for 2008, however, profits per equity partner lagged behind, falling by nearly 3% over the year. The New York firm saw turnover increase to $760.8 (£537.25m), on the back of significant litigation and white-collar investigation work for clients including Siemens AG. However, PEP dropped to $2.23m (£1.57m), showing that the firm is not immune to the effects of the financial crisis.

    1 minute read

  • February 19, 2009 |

    Shearman PEP down 9% but firm eyes 'opportunity'

    Shearman & Sterling has posted a 4.9% dip in revenues to $876m (£608m) for 2008, along with a 9.6% fall in profits per equity partner to $1.665m (£1.15m). The percentage declines recorded by Shearman were similar to those reported by Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom and in the middle of the pack for major New York firms that have so far posted their results."It was the second-best year in the firm's history," said senior partner Rohan Weerasinghe. "That we did as well as we did is a testament to the strength of our platform globally."Shearman is more global than some of its US peers, with 45% of its lawyers based overseas, but less diversified in its practice mix, with only 22% of its revenues deriving from litigation.

    1 minute read

  • February 19, 2009 |

    Editor's Comment: A happy cult?

    Of the firms with any pretence to global credibility, there is no doubt that Latham & Watkins, until recently, had the best brand. That's not to say its partnership or client base match up to a Linklaters or Skadden - plainly, they don't. But having hauled itself out of its Drexel-induced hangover of the early 1990s, the firm had built a phenomenal brand that obscured the odd shortcoming and made it the easiest client in recruitment. The building blocks of this were strong leadership, clear strategy and sound quality control. But the key factor was its genius in marrying a performance culture with a supportive atmosphere. Many firms have achieved one or the other but Latham was the only one of its global peer group that managed both for any length of time. It was this trait that led the firm to be once described in an influential US directory as "a cult, but a happy cult". And bottom-line performance was every bit as impressive. When in 2007, Latham became one of only two US firms to generate more than $2bn (£1.4bn) in revenue, the firm crowned a five-year period in which it achieved incredible growth, while profitability and its global network had likewise expanded.

    1 minute read

  • February 18, 2009 |

    QC 2009 – they'll be back

    You have to give the QC system credit - no matter how many times it's predicted to be on the way out, just like the Terminator, it keeps coming back for more. And the current round, announced today, appears to be winning more support at the Bar after the two earlier rounds of the relaunched QC kitemark were met with criticism for an unwieldy and expensive applications process. By general consent, the revised and slimmed-down version has been an improvement, even if the new version has come at a considerable cost – around £6,000 for successful applicants.

    1 minute read

  • February 12, 2009 |

    Profits dip at Sullivan, Skadden and Davis Polk

    Wall Street leaders Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom, Sullivan & Cromwell and Davis Polk & Wardwell have all posted falling profits for 2008, it has emerged, despite the trio avoiding year-on-year declines in revenues. The Am Law Daily reports that Skadden managed to remain the highest-grossing law firm in the US top 100 to date, eking out a 1.4% increase in gross revenue to reach a 2008 total of $2.2bn (£1.47bn). In a dreadful year for M&A, Skadden's corporate practice was relatively strong, particularly in representing takeover targets.Gross revenue at Sullivan and Davis Polk, both of which logged thousands of hours in hectic bailout-related work in the last quarter of 2008, was flat. Sullivan grossed $985m (£670m) and Davis Polk $789m (£537m) - both exactly matching their 2007 results.

    1 minute read