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  • July 24, 2008 |

    Top lawyers call for career guidance for older partners

    Some of the City's leading legal names have called for more options to be made available to partners as they approach retirement age. Figures including Linklaters senior partner David Cheyne and Slaughter and May corporate partner Nigel Boardman joined a roundtable hosted by Dominique Graham, director at consultancy Graham Gill, to look at what firms should be doing for partners coming up to retirement. Participants called for firms to offer those nearing retirement age help to find positions outside the law and, in particular, to start dealing with the issue earlier on.

    1 minute read

  • July 17, 2008 |

    Magic circle firms confirm status in global elite

    The US's top law firms have outperformed their key UK rivals, despite a year of robust growth from the UK's leading practices. Legal Week's top 50 shows that UK firms achieved average revenue growth of 12.5% during 2007-08. This compares with an increase of revenue in 13.6% at the 100 largest law firms in the US in 2007, according to The American Lawyer, Legal Week's US sister title.

    1 minute read

  • July 17, 2008 |

    Sao Paulo sizzles as US firms hit Brazil market

    After jetting down to Sao Paulo every few weeks for years, Jonathan Bisgaier has as many close friends in Brazil's largest city as he does in his native New York. And, starting this month, he'll be seeing them even more often. The Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom partner heads up the firm's newly opened Sao Paulo office, joining a recent rush of Am Law 200 firms opening up in Latin America's hottest economy. "As robust as everything has been for some time, it's been even more so since 2004," says Bisgaier, who brings with him half a dozen Portuguese-speaking associates from New York. "The view is that Brazil has finally broken out of its boom-and-bust cycle."

    1 minute read

  • July 17, 2008 |

    City partners predict harder times but growth will continue

    Despite a stream of negative headlines and gloomy predictions that the UK is entering into a recession, two-thirds of senior City partners are still forecasting revenues to increase over the next 12 months. Legal Week's quarterly business confidence poll shows that while confidence levels have fallen for the third quarter in a row, many of those surveyed still expect commercial law firms to keep growing through the downturn. Just under 54% of respondents to the Big Question survey said they expected billings at their firm to increase by up to 10% over the next 12 months, while a further 11% were bullishly predicting growth of more than 10%.

    1 minute read

  • July 10, 2008 |

    Magic circle trio break into profits top 10 as City firms move up Global 100

    Profits per equity partner (PEP) at top US law firms still narrowly exceed key UK rivals - despite the significant increases the magic circle have achieved in turnover and profitability in recent years. Figures compiled by Legal Week and The American Lawyer show that just three UK firms make it into the global top 10 by PEP - Slaughter and May, Linklaters and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer. In contrast, seven US firms make the grade - headed by elite firm Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz.

    1 minute read

  • July 10, 2008 | International Edition

    Magic circle trio break into profits top 10 as City firms move up Global 100

    Profits per equity partner (PEP) at top US law firms still narrowly exceed key UK rivals - despite the significant increases the magic circle have achieved in turnover and profitability in recent years. Figures compiled by Legal Week and The American Lawyer show that just three UK firms make it into the global top 10 by PEP - Slaughter and May, Linklaters and Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer. In contrast, seven US firms make the grade - headed by elite firm Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz.

    1 minute read

  • July 9, 2008 |

    Skadden and CC win $3.6bn News Corp roles

    Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom and Clifford Chance (CC) have landed lead roles on the proposed $3.6bn (£1.8bn) sale of NDS Group by its parent company, broadcasting giant News Corp.

    1 minute read

  • July 7, 2008 |

    Shearman corporate chief set to join Weil Gotshal

    Shearman & Sterling's respected head of corporate Peter King is set to join Weil Gotshal & Manges as a partner in the US firm's corporate team. King will join Weil Gotshal at the end of the month and will be charged with building the firm's M&A practice.King joined Shearman in 2003 from Linklaters, where he trained and became a partner in 1990. At Shearman he was responsible for the development of the London M&A and equity capital markets strategy.

    1 minute read

  • June 25, 2008 |

    Making history with Obama

    The day after the Pennsylvania Democratic primary, Eric Holder Jr is working from Covington & Burling's elegant new Manhattan offices inside the year-old New York Times Building. He is there to prep Fernando Aguirre, the chief executive of Chiquita Brands International, for an interview with US news show 60 Minutes, which will be broadcasting a segment on the company's past involvement with Colombian right-wing paramilitary forces. Last March, Holder helped Chiquita secure a slap-on-the-wrist plea deal to charges that it had paid off the terrorists.But before the Aguirre meeting, Holder has to place a call to Warren Ballentine, a nationally-syndicated African-American radio talkshow host, who wants to discuss last night's primary results.

    1 minute read

  • June 20, 2008 |

    Ex-Bear Stearns GC resurfaces at lender WaMu

    US lending giant Washington Mutual (WaMu) has hired the former general counsel (GC) of stricken investment bank Bear Stearns. It named Michael Solender as its executive vice president and chief legal officer earlier this month (4 June). Solender will take on responsibility for overseeing the company's legal, compliance and government relations functions, reporting to chief executive Kerry Killinger. He also becomes a member of the group's executive committee.

    1 minute read