A debarred defendant has offered to fund the ex-CEO of London Capital & Finance (LCF) Michael Thomson in one of The Lawyer’s Top 20 cases of 2024 as various asset freezing orders have left him struggling to pay his legal costs. The suit is between LCF and eight defendants allegedly involved in a “Ponzi scheme”, […]
Top 20 London Capital & Finance case kicks off After a three-week delay, another of The Lawyer’s top 20 cases of 2024 is finally going to court today (19 February). The administrators of London Capital & Finance (LCF) are taking eight defendants, including former executives, to what is due to be a 20-week-long trial. An […]
Simmons & Simmons has swooped in to defend Google in what will be the firm’s second class action mandate in the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT). The £7bn lawsuit was filed in September 2023 by the co-founder and CEO of Consumer Voice, Nikki Stopford. Dubbed the “cost of living crisis” class action, Stopford accuses Google of […]
This week on Spotlight, we check out the aviation disputes team at Morgan Lewis & Bockius as it brings a large number of operator policy claims against insurers in the mammoth Russian aviation litigation, which featured in The Lawyer’s top 20 cases of 2024. The market: Aviation is both an extremely international and consistently high-value industry. An issue […]
A debarred defendant has offered to fund the ex-CEO of London Capital & Finance (LCF) Michael Thomson in one of The Lawyer’s Top 20 cases of 2024 as various asset freezing orders have left him struggling to pay his legal costs. The suit is between LCF and eight defendants allegedly involved in a “Ponzi scheme”, […]
Top 20 London Capital & Finance case kicks off After a three-week delay, another of The Lawyer’s top 20 cases of 2024 is finally going to court today (19 February). The administrators of London Capital & Finance (LCF) are taking eight defendants, including former executives, to what is due to be a 20-week-long trial. An […]
Simmons & Simmons has swooped in to defend Google in what will be the firm’s second class action mandate in the Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT). The £7bn lawsuit was filed in September 2023 by the co-founder and CEO of Consumer Voice, Nikki Stopford. Dubbed the “cost of living crisis” class action, Stopford accuses Google of […]
This week on Spotlight, we check out the aviation disputes team at Morgan Lewis & Bockius as it brings a large number of operator policy claims against insurers in the mammoth Russian aviation litigation, which featured in The Lawyer’s top 20 cases of 2024. The market: Aviation is both an extremely international and consistently high-value industry. An issue […]
Welcome to this week’s edition of The Hearing, your weekly insider’s guide to the UK litigation market. The new Serious Fraud Office (SFO) chief gave his first speech since taking office, giving the broadsheets a raft of headlines about paying whistle-blowers. Corporate and white collar crime investigations lawyers have been short of work in recent […]
Does anyone need any confirmation of the gradual takeover of the City by rampaging US law firms? No, thought not. If, however, your answer is yes, then more evidence of the Americanisation of London can be found in the upcoming edition of the UK Corporate 50. Much of the focus in this year’s report is […]
Mexico is set to welcome thousands of lawyers later this year when the capital city plays host to the International Bar Association’s (IBA) showpiece event. Partners and support staff will mingle from dawn until way after dusk, discuss strategies and scan way off into the horizon. However, Mexico’s been high on the interest list for […]
At times, Clyde & Co appeared dangerously close to squandering the growth opportunities presented by its July 2022 acquisition of BLM. The firm’s most recent financials, however, suggest BLM was the fuel Clydes needed to grow in the UK. Not that it has been without casualties, with a significant proportion of former BLM partners having […]
The M&A rankings for the first half of 2024 confirmed one thing we already felt was true: that Linklaters and Slaughter and May have had a lot of acquisitive or targeted clients this year. According to data provided by the London Stock Exchange Group, the pair rank first and second respectively in terms of the […]
When Stephenson Harwood chief executive Eifion Morris set a target for doubling revenue to £400m by 2027, he knew it would be a tough challenge. “A profitable growth strategy will probably take more than individual lateral joiners and internal promotions to achieve,” he told The Lawyer back in 2021. This protective view came as the […]
BDB Pitmans partners have voted through proposals that will see the firm transition to a CMS-style network model, having called off merger talks with Womble Bond Dickinson in 2023. The firm has signed a letter of intent with Alvarez & Marsal Legal Services (AMLS) to help internationalise the business. Both BDB Pitmans and AMLS issued […]
Welcome to The Passport, your regular round-up of the most important stories to come from the European legal market. In this edition, we look at how CMS zoomed past Dentons in the Polish lawyer headcount stakes; why you might have to get used to the idea of three firms with ‘Snellman’ in their name; and […]
Akin Gump has recruited three of Cooley’s London partners, including its City managing partner Justin Stock. Stock moves to Akin along with Stephen Rosen and David Bresnick. The three focus on transactions with a life sciences and technology element. At Akin, Stock will become the firm’s international head of technology. Both Stock and Bresnick joined […]
For elite firms with ties to big banks, the first half of 2024 has been fruitful for corporate transactions. Sainsbury’s banking business was sold to NatWest Group last month, with Linklaters and A&O Shearman advising, while Addleshaw Goddard, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Paul Hastings led on Co-operative Bank’s sale to Coventry Building Society in an […]
Mills & Reeve’s turnover rose by double digits in 2023/24 to a new record high that has resulted in the firm’s highest-ever all-staff bonus pool of £3m. The firm’s turnover rose by 14.1 per cent to £168m, beating its 2025 strategic target of £150m a year ahead of schedule. The firm has not yet revealed […]