A few months back, 19 Am Law 100 law firms celebrated $ 2 million
profits per partner for 2007.
Coupling a small bump in gross revenue with diligent cost - cutting efforts, Holland & Knight enjoyed a double - digit increase in
profits per partner for the second straight year in 2011, according to The American Lawyer's reporting.
Not exact matches
«We have seen the arrival of the world's first # 1bn law firm, Clifford Chance, and Pinsent Mason's astonishing 71
per cent increase in
profits per equity
partner (the all important benchmark
for law firm performance).»
Bond Dickinson's average
profit per equity
partner (PEP) has dropped 4 % from # 275,000 to # 265,000, as turnover remained flat at # 104m
for 2016 - 17.
Travers Smith has reported revenue growth of 13 % and an increase in
profit per equity
partner (PEP) of 8 %
for the year ended 30 June 2016.
As
for «
profits per partner,» the metric that matters most to firms, nineteen firms had
profits per partner of $ 2 million or more, an increase of four over last year.
The
profits -
per -
partner numbers
for Canada's big firms are not widely available in the same way as those of Americans (AmLaw 200) and U.K. (U.K. 200) lawyers, and — so I've been told — are not as high.
Watson Farley & Williams and Holman Fenwick Willian have posted rising
profit per equity
partner (PEP) figures
for 2016 - 17, while insurance rival Kennedys has seen PEP dip after a sustained period of international expansion.
Law firms also closed ranks and upped the requirements
for partnership (especially after the American Lawyer started openly publishing
profits -
per -
partner numbers in 1985.)
This will come at a particularly bad time
for law firms, which are getting very strong signals from corporate clients that they're tired of underwriting the latest record
profit -
per -
partner numbers.
Macfarlanes defied the depressed UK and European markets this year to record its second set of strong financial results in a row, with revenue up by 11.6 % and
profits per equity
partner (PEP) increasing by 9.5 %
for 2012 - 13.
It reached turnover of # 1.303 bn
for 2011 - 12, and saw
profit per equity
partner (PEP) rise 7 % to # 1.078 m.
Profits per partner, after dropping consecutively
for three years, rose 2.7 % in 2016 to $ 2.115 m (# 1.69 m).
Herbert Smith Freehills (HSF) has announced a 2.5 % drop in
profit per equity
partner (PEP)
for 2016 - 17, alongside a 10.6 % rise in revenue.
Back then, the firm had just come off a banner year, with
profits per partner of $ 2.9 million
for 2006, double the figure from 2002.
Taylor Wessing's UK arm boosted its
profit per equity
partner (PEP) by 17 % over the last financial year, its results
for 2014 - 15 show.
Still, with global firms bringing in billions in revenue and
profits per partner at the top 10 firms all well over $ 2 million, it is hard to offer them much sympathy
for having had to weather the downturn.
«On a macro level, the news is good
for these firms: Revenue was up year - over-year by 7 %, revenue
per lawyer by 9 %, and
profits per partner by 11 %.
But
for MacEwen, asking whether $ 160,000 is too high a salary is the wrong question; the ratio of associate salaries to PPP (
profits per partner) also matters.
The firm is yet to provide
profit figures
for the past financial year, and last year declined to provide a figure
for profit per equity
partner.
Profit per equity partner for the sub-unit equals its profit divided by the notional number of equity partners attributable to the sub
Profit per equity
partner for the sub-unit equals its
profit divided by the notional number of equity partners attributable to the sub
profit divided by the notional number of equity
partners attributable to the sub-unit.
According to a report by the Georgetown Law Center
for the Study of the Legal Profession, U.S. law firms saw revenue and
profits per equity
partner grow at staggering rates of 37.5 percent and 25.6 percent respectively.
Using the
profit per partner metric allows comparing the relative contribution to the firm's
profits per equity
partner of,
for example, a low - margin practice area having high associate leverage and a high - margin,
partner - intensive practice area.
If you follow the legal media, one of the biggest stories so far this year was when the major law firm, Dentons, announced it was no longer reporting average
profits per equity
partner, saying that it was a meaningless statistic
for a firm that operates in so many global jurisdictions.
Maister's Formula
for Profitability, which has been influential in shaping law firms» profitability strategies, provides insight into the variables that can be leveraged to keep
profits per partner high.
Profits per partner at Cadwalader rose to $ 2.4 m (# 1.5 m)
for 2009, while revenue
per lawyer climbed by 3 % to almost $ 1m (# 614,000).
Ever since large law firm salaries
for new associates jumped to $ 160,000 back in January, we've heard commentary from a variety of constituencies, ranging from (see this post) law firm recruiters, warning that increased billables will place more pressure on associates, to lawyers, arguing that increased salaries demand concommitant salary raises
for the judiciary, to (see this post) law firm economists, suggesting that associate salaries are proportionately lower than ever when viewed in the context of their relationship to
profits per partner, to law firm marketers who view increased rates as opening opportunities
for less expensive, midsized firms.
RPC has posted a 12.4 % drop in
profit per equity
partner (PEP)
for 2016 - 17 after a year in which the firm expanded its all - equity partnership and invested in new business lines.
Reed Smith has posted a 7 % rise in global revenue
for 2014, while average
profits per equity
partner (PEP) have increased by 6 %.
His extended note begins, «A possible explanation
for the lower
profits per partner in the U.K. is that clients in the U.K. are more sophisticated, demanding, less willing to pay high rates, and more insistent on budgets... If U.K. companies spend less proportionally on legal fees, there's less money to go round...»
LG has posted a 26 % drop in
profits per equity
partner (PEP)
for 2011 - 12, with revenue also fallng
for a second consecutive year.
Lawrence Graham has posted a 7 % fall in revenue
for the 2012 - 13 financial year, while
profits per equity
partner (PEP) dropped 14 %.
Now, brace yourself
for Henderson's highly counterintuitive findings: In his opinion, firms that have switched to two - tier structures that allow so - called «nonequity» partnerships are actually producing lower
profits per partner (PPP) and have lower prestige.
The firm posted a 2.2 % increase fee income to reach # 94m
for the 2010 - 11 financial year, while
profits per equity
partner (PEP) rose 7 % to # 510,000.
DAC Beachcroft has posted rising turnover and profitability
for the 2016 - 17 financial year, with
profit per equity
partner (PEP) rising to a new record high.
Macfarlanes has posted a 16.7 % fall in
profit per equity
partner (PEP) in the last financial year as net
profit for the firm fell 8.9 %.
When firms are laying off associates to stay afloat (or,
for the more cynical, to preserve
profits per partner), will they still care about associate happiness — or be grateful to see associates leave voluntarily to spare themselves the negative publicity of announcing mass terminations?
Specialist litigation firm Stewarts Law has posted a 30 % jump in average
profit per equity
partner (PEP) to # 2m
for the 2016 - 17 year.
Ashurst has announced an 11.5 %
profit per equity
partner (PEP) hike to # 672,000
for 2016 - 17, marking a rebound
for the firm after a difficult 2015 - 16 when PEP plummeted by almost 20 % and revenue fell 10 %.
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld has posted a double - digit increase in
profits per partner (PEP)
for 2017, with the metric rising 13.5 % to $ 2.4 m after another strong year
for lobbying and dealmaking.
Average
profits per equity
partner at Maclays now stands at # 315,000 - a 15 % increase on the # 275,000 recorded last year, when the firm released its full annual results
for the first time.
The City firm took in fee income of # 57.5 m
for the last financial year, broadly in line with the 2011 - 12 figure of # 57.6 m, while
profits per equity
partner (PEP) fell 3 % from # 303,000 to # 293,000.
The Foundation has also argued that Reed Smith's fealty global clients and PPP (
profits per partner) lead the firm to charge more than what is appropriate
for a smaller client which lacks financial resources.
Berrymans Lace Mawer has posted a 4 % increase in revenue
for 2012 - 13 while seeing
profits per equity
partner (PEP) dip by 13 %.
Simmons & Simmons has posted a 10 % drop in
profit per equity
partner (PEP)
for the 2015 - 16 financial year to # 585,000, as the firms costs rose «significantly».
Dentons has opted to stop reporting average
profits per equity
partner, citing the metric as «meaningless»
for a global firm, and claiming it could be potentially damaging to client relations.
Tarbert is leaving A&O after a strong 2016 - 17
for the magic circle firm, which this July posted a 26 % increase in
profit per equity
partner to # 1.51 m, while revenue rose 16 % to # 1.52 bn.
Watson Farley & Williams has strengthened its London office with the addition of two
partners from US law firms, in the wake of a strong 2016 - 17
for the firm which is expected to result in
profit per equity
partner (PEP) rising by at least 25 %.
Olswang and pre-merger Berrymans Lace Mawer have each grown their revenues
for 2013 - 14, with
profits per equity
partner (PEP) at the former expected to dip by nearly 4 %.
Ashurst has posted falling revenue and
profit per equity
partner (PEP)
for the second year running, with PEP falling to an 11 - year low.