Solicitors and barristers have called off their legal aid strike after 52 days as a ‘gesture of goodwill’ to the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) following discussions over further cuts to fees.
Continue reading “Strike no more: Solicitors call off legal aid protest after 52 days”
Berwin Leighton Paisner (BLP) has boosted its insurance practice and expanded its regulatory offering by recruiting Clyde & Co’s leading insurance partner Geradline Quirk.
Continue reading “City moves: BLP looks to broaden insurance offering with Clyde & Co’s Quirk”
One of Scotland’s oldest commercial legal practices, the Glasgow-based McClure Naismith, is looking for a white knight merger as it reviews its options after finding the firm ‘lacks the scale needed to compete’.
As McClure Naismith reveals its difficulties in the Scottish market today (20 August), Burness Paull has shown it is not all doom and gloom for independent Scottish firms by posting double-digit growth in both turnover and profits, with revenues increasing by 11% to £51.3m and profits up 12% to £23.2m.
Ashurst is set to move its entire London operation to a new location at 1-10 Brushfield Street in Spitalfields in 2019 after having shifted its Sydney-based operations last month.
Continue reading “After 30 years of Appold Street, Ashurst set for new City location in 2019”
The recruiters are scouring the market for project managers (PM) to work in law firms. But whilst firms can agree on the title, they don’t agree on the role specification and often the real job is different yet again. So what exactly are they looking for, and why are many firms failing to find them?
Continue reading “Guest post: Legal project managers – pioneers or homesteaders?”
A client of City-based law firm Royds has been granted a landmark ruling over an insurance-related dispute against insurer AIG with the High Court clarifying the Solicitors’ Minimum Terms of Cover rules.
Tech-focused firm Fieldfisher bagged an advisory role opposite a five-partner team from Slaughter and May as private equity duo Palamon Capital Partners and Corsair Capital purchased online foreign exchange provider Currencies Direct for £200m.
Ropes & Gray is pushing on with its City build-out with McDermott Will & Emery data privacy co-chairs joining the firm’s privacy and data security practice in London and Boston.
Irwin Mitchell has outperformed the relatively flat growth of its insurance-focused peers with modest turnover growth of 4% from £202.7m to £210.6m, along with a 6% rise in profits before tax from £17.1m to £18.1m.
The first of the Magic Circle’s big four to announce its trainee retention rate, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer is set to see 40 newly-qualified lawyers walk through its door this autumn, from a trainee intake of 48.
Continue reading “40 out of 48: Freshfields keeps on 83% of autumn 2015 trainees”
Latham & Watkins has returned to Clifford Chance (CC) for another star hire, with German banking chief Alexandra Hagelüken becoming the latest senior partner to switch allegiances.
Continue reading “Senior CC German exits mount as Latham recruits head of banking Hagelüken”
OK, the headline is clickbait – kind of. There does, of course, need to be an investigation into Quindell’s financial ‘restatements’, which it admitted earlier this month meant that the 2013 profit after tax of £83m should have been a loss of £68m, and net assets at 31 December 2013 should have been £446m, rather than £668m. That’s a seriously wonky piece of accounting.
Continue reading “Guest post: Why the fuss over Quindell and Slater & Gordon?”
After having carried out a strategic review which will see the Global 100 firm look to create three ‘best-in-class’ international practices, Bryan Cave has hired Macfarlanes‘ structured finance and capital markets chief Rachel Kelly as part of a drive to build its financial services offering in the City.
Greenberg Traurig Maher is moving its London offices to the EU’s tallest building, The Shard of Glass, as the firm plans to bulk up its main practice areas in a wider pan-European push.
Four years on from its last review, British insurer Prudential, which recently posted double-digit profit growth, has kicked off the tendering process for spots on its legal panel.
Continue reading “In-house: Firms look to ensure places as Prudential assesses legal roster”
With the frontrunners having emerged earlier this summer, the partnership board at Linklaters has formalised the six-man shortlist to replace Simon Davies as managing partner.
After having already announced tie-ups with China’s Dacheng and US firm McKenna Long & Aldridge this year, Dentons is pushing on with its expansion plans by holding talks with Watford-headquartered firm Matthew Arnold & Baldwin (MAB).
A long-running case between Dechert and the administrator of the now dissolved Coudert Brothers over the former’s hiring of Paris and Brussels-based partners has finally come to an end with the US dispute shop agreeing to pay $2.4m in a settlement.
Continue reading “Ten years after hiring Coudert partners, Dechert pays $2.4m to settle dispute”
Westminster firm Bircham Dyson Bell has posted respectable financial results for the 2014/15 year as it grew income 10% to £34.5m from £31.3m and generated profits of £11.1m – up 18%.
Continue reading “Profits jump 18% at Bircham Dyson Bell as turnover benefits from boutique buy”
