If you only read the stats, you would be forgiven for thinking that the LB100’s 26-50 group has struggled this year. The numbers are uncharacteristically grim for the second quartile: profit per lawyer (PPL) dipped 8% from £79,000 to £73,000 and profit per equity partner (PEP) dropped 3% to £633,000.

Revenue metrics are more favourable – average turnover grew a solid 8% to £167m from £154.7m, while revenue per lawyer (RPL) was up 6% from £273,000 to £290,000. However, this pales in comparison to the blistering growth of the LB100’s top 25, and is a far cry from last year’s eye-catching 19% hike in PEP among the 26-50 group. Continue reading “LB100: The second 25 – Off the pace”

The 27 regional and national firms occupying the 51-100 spots in this year’s LB100 come in with an average of 267 lawyers and 27 equity partners. But despite weathering Covid well, with average revenue increases of 11% and 13% in 2020 and 2021 respectively, our 2022 report sees growth flatten out, with average revenue up just 4% to £54.9m.

Alongside static revenues, profit per lawyer (PPL) fell 5% with average lawyer numbers up 7%. Meanwhile, although firms managed to make profit per equity partner (PEP) gains — with the average up 14% to £402,000, outpacing last year’s already robust 8% hike — this is coupled with a 10% decrease in average equity partner numbers. Continue reading “LB100: The second 50: Regional view – Steadying the ship”

‘There is a real mismatch in how gloomy the economy feels and how busy the legal professional feels,’ observes Deborah Finkler, Slaughter and May’s managing partner. ‘We’re incredibly busy and it wouldn’t surprise me that in the similar conversations you’re having with other managing partners, they will say the same. There is just a lot of work.’

When our 2021 Legal Business 100 (LB100) report was published, the profession was riding high on the back of booming deal flow that saw profits and revenues surge to previously unmatched levels. Fast forward 12 months, and the economic outlook is very different. Spiralling inflation, interest rate hikes and the macroeconomic issues resulting from Russia’s continued invasion of Ukraine have made discussions of ‘softening in the market’ commonplace. Continue reading “LB100: Overview – Turning tides”

Shifts that started with the financial crash galvanised in the decade that followed. Predictions of the rise of US firms were hastened by the reputational demise of banking clients and the acceleration of the private equity market. ‘Clients that were niche pre-financial crisis – the likes of Blackstone, KKR and Carlyle – became the successors of Wall Street. The shift from public capital to private capital helped the US firms. They tracked that change and broke open the market,’ recalls Sebastian Prichard Jones, senior partner of Macfarlanes.

This shook the Magic Circle pedestal. ‘The original Magic Circle no longer had the grip on the market. Instead, the market became broader, more open and no longer concentrated on the FTSE and the investment banks, making it a more interesting and diverse market for firms like ours,’ adds Prichard Jones. Continue reading “30 years of LB100 – 2012-22: Don’t look now”

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Continue reading “Legal Business 100 2022 – contents”