Mills & Reeve and CMS Cameron McKenna boosted their offerings at opposite ends of the insurance spectrum this week, taking staff from the Birmingham office of DLA Piper and the City office of RPC respectively.
Top 50 UK firm Mills & Reeve acquired a nine-strong defendant insurance practice from DLA, marking the conclusion of DLA’s withdrawal from the typically lower margin area of law, as first announced by the top 10 firm last year.
Clifford Chance (CC) has hired Norton Rose Fulbright (NRF) corporate insurance partner Ashley Prebble as the Magic Circle firm aims to boost its Lloyds and London market and general insurance capability.
Prebble, who will work closely with the firm’s private equity and regulatory teams, specialises in corporate and regulatory insurance work including initial public offerings (IPOs), mergers and acquisitions, Part VII transfers, distribution agreements and regulatory matters. Continue reading “CC to boost London corporate and regulatory insurance capability with hire of NRF’s Ashley Prebble”
West End boutique Forsters has appointed Fiona Smith to take over as head of the private client department as it achieves a run of 164% revenue increase over five years.
Smith, who succeeds current head David Robinson at the Mayfair firm, specialises in offshore tax planning, wills, trusts and probate law. She acts as adviser to many of the firm’s longstanding clients, including media figures, entrepreneurs, charities, landed estates and directors or owners of listed UK companies.
Her appointment comes just weeks after the LB100 firm posted a 16% revenue increase, with fee income coming in ahead of budget at £32.5m, up from £28m in 2011-12. Continue reading “Forsters appoints new private client head as department hits 164% revenue increase over five years”
Allen & Overy (A&O) has hired Visa Europe’s general counsel (GC) and executive vice president and company secretary Vanessa Turner as a partner in its global antitrust practice.
Turner will be based in the Magic Circle’s Brussels office, advising European and international clients dealing with EU and other regulators on merger clearance, cartels and other antitrust and competition matters. Continue reading “Visa Europe’s GC joins A&O’s global antitrust practice”
Securing a major deal and having one of your partners take a senior role with the same client is a nice trick to pull off but Allen & Overy (A&O) appears to have managed that this week after securing a lead role on the Co-op’s rescue plan and ‘donating’ a veteran partner to the lender’s management team.
Taylor Wessing is to make 26 of its City secretaries redundant with all 96 secretaries in London put on notice pending a consultation.
As first revealed by RollOnFriday, the firm has not yet entered a formal consultation but expects the process to last for at least 30 days.
Continue reading “Taylor Wessing to review 96 City secretarial jobs leaving 26 redundant”
SJ Berwin has become the latest leading UK law firm to release its 2012-13 financial results, with its unaudited accounts revealing an increase in revenue of 2% to £184.6m, exceeding last year’s growth figure of 1.1% to £180.1m.
Profit figures have yet to finalised but early indications suggest that net profit has risen slightly at the top 25 UK firm, although profits per equity (PEP) partner have contracted by up to 10% in light of expansion to the partnership over the past year, falling from £635,000 to around £570,000. Continue reading “SJ Berwin reveals turnover increase of 2% as partnership expansion hits PEP”
Rated Herbert Smith Freehills (HSF) City tax disputes lawyer Rupert Shiers is set to join Hogan Lovells to head its direct tax disputes practice.
Shiers will start in his new role on Monday (24 June), working alongside indirect tax disputes head Michael Conlon QC. He focuses on disputes with HM Revenue & Customs and has led appeals to the First-tier tribunal, Upper Tribunal, Court of Appeal and Supreme Court, as well as references to the European Court of Justice. His clients have included Cadbury Schweppes and BMW Holding. Continue reading “Hogan Lovells hires rated HSF tax partner in another post merger exit for the firm”
Osborne Clarke has ended a year of international expansion with 2012-13 revenues up by 14% to £112m as it beds down new offices in Italy and Spain.
The revenue growth masks a couple of slow periods for the firm’s transactional business in what managing partner Simon Beswick described as a ‘lumpy market’. Discounting revenues from the top 40 UK firm’s new offices, its year-on-year turnover figure fell by 1% from £98m in 2011-12 to £97m in 2012-13.
The 410-lawyer firm posted a dip in net profits during the same financial period, down 5% from £37m to £35m. Continue reading “Osborne Clarke reaps benefit of year of European expansion with revenue increase of 14%”
As court staff go on strike this afternoon (17 June) in protest at the Ministry of Justice’s (MoJ’s) plans to cut £220m off the annual criminal legal aid budget, it is with the support of many City lawyers.
The unusual move comes as the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) last week claimed the MoJ’s plans could breach human rights laws and as lawyers warn that cuts made to civil legal aid earlier this year are already leading to a significant increase in pro bono requests and in areas outside of their expertise. Continue reading “City lawyers say court strike will cause minimal disruption but should be given due attention”
Top 20 UK law firm Pinsent Masons has seen its year-on-year turnover increase by 40% from £221m to £309m thanks to its merger with McGrigors in June last year.
The firms, which would have had a combined turnover last year of around £294m, have in real terms seen a growth in revenue of 5%.
The increase comes after a year of international expansion during which Pinsents opened new offices in Munich, Paris and Istanbul, for the first time giving it more offices overseas than in the UK. Continue reading “Pinsent Masons’ post merger revenue up by 40%”
If upgrading your square footage is any litmus test of how City firms feel about the future then a raft of them including DLA Piper, Bird & Bird and Field Fisher Waterhouse (FFW) can be said to be in confident mood.
As reported by Property Week on Tuesday (11 June), top Global 100 firm DLA is the most recent UK firm looking to expand its City office space, hiring Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL) to carry out a search for up to 200,000 sq ft of space, an increase on the 110,000 sq ft office it currently occupies in Noble Street. Continue reading “Comment: Say what you like, City practices taking on larger real estate is a good sign”
Macfarlanes and Dechert have made key strategic hires in the past few days while top 35, 382-lawyer UK firm Olswang has bolstered its City tax practice with the arrival of partner Andrew Quale from Eversheds.
Specialising in employee incentives and rewards, Quale has experience of advising multinational companies on the implementation of global incentive plans. Continue reading “Revolving Doors: Olswang, Macfarlanes, Dechert, DWF and Weightmans in strategic partner hires”
Slaughter and May is advising Punch Taverns on its £2.4bn securitised debt restructuring as the UK’s largest pub company warns creditors it could face administration.
On Monday (10 June) a powerful group of lenders rejected plans to reduce the pub group’s interest payments to £32m a year. Slaughters led by corporate partner David Johnson is advising longstanding client Punch, which owns around 5000 pubs across the UK. Continue reading “Slaughters leads on Punch Taverns £2.4bn debt restructuring as pub group warns it could face administration”
Nabarro’s profit per equity partner (PEP) has risen by 30% over the past financial year, figures released by the firm today (13 June) reveal.
Preliminary figures show the firm’s net profits increased by 11% from 2012-13, while PEP has risen from £332,000 to £430,000 during the same period.
The firm’s annual turnover is up by 2.6% from £113.4m in 2011/12 to £116.3m in 2012/13. Continue reading “Nabarro’s PEP up by 30% as firm posts modest growth in revenue”
A Consumer Rights Bill published on Wednesday (12 June) is set to radically overhaul the rights of consumers in the digital age but could open the door to US-style class actions, lawyers warn.
The Bill was one of many announced in the Queen’s speech at the state opening of Parliament in May, and if enacted, will enhance consumer rights by making them easier to understand and streamline complex areas of consumer legislation into a single bill. Continue reading “Consumer protection dragged into 21st century with new Bill that could open floodgates to class actions”
London dominated the lateral hiring scene over the past week with firms including US Chadbourne & Parke, Allen & Overy (A&O), Eversheds and Pinsent Masons strengthening their City offering.
Chadbourne’s 36-lawyer London office, which acts a hub for the firm’s emerging and developing markets practice, has hired banking and finance partner Partha Pal from the City arm of top 15 US firm Sidley Austin. Continue reading “Revolving Doors: Chadbourne, A&O, Trowers and Pinsent Masons boost City offering”
The landmark divorce battle between Yasmin and Michael Prest has come to an end as the Supreme Court today (12 June) ruled Prest should hand over properties held by companies under his control.
The ruling – the most significant divorce case to reach the UK’s highest court since the 2010 judgment in Radmacher v Granatino – has been touted as instrumental in establishing whether London remains a key forum for resolving big-money divorce cases. The case has also been watched for its impact on the court’s treatment of the corporate veil, which protects company assets. Continue reading “Still the divorce capital of the world – Supreme Court orders businessman to hand over assets in key ruling”
Major law firms continue to appropriate ideas from legal process outsourcing with Ashurst today (12 June) announcing a venture to create a 150-strong unit in Glasgow to support its practice.
The venture, which will launch later this year, will cover back office support and volume legal work, initially covering areas like document review in litigation and corporate. Continue reading “Sort of offshoring – Ashurst to create new Glasgow unit to lower costs as City leaders push for value”
Ask yourself this question: do you think of yourself as a professional? For many readers of this blog, I suspect the answer to that question is a rather straightforward, Yes. Now ask yourself this question. Does thinking of yourself as a professional make you more or less ethical?
That is the fascinating issue explored in a new paper from Maryam Kouchaki from the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard. I urge all of you with an interest to read it.
Continue reading “Guest post: What does thinking like a professional mean?”
