Wake Up Call: U.K.’s Clyde & Co, BLM to Form 2,600-Lawyer Firm

In today’s column, international sanctions against Russia are gumming up the world’s financial system; Milbank’s gross revenues rose 10% to about $1.36 billion in 2021; Baker Botts and Choate Hall & Stewart matched the Cravath scale for associate pay.

• Leading off, partners of U.K-based Clyde & Co—focused on insurance, energy, trade & commodities, infrastructure and transport—and smaller insurance-focused BLM voted to combine into a firm with about 2,600 lawyers worldwide. The firm, with about 735 million pounds (about $808 million) in revenues, would have around 490 equity partners. (Law.com International) (The Lawyer) The tie-up will significantly boost the scale of Clyde’s U.K. casualty insurance insurance practice, a report says. (Intelligent Insurer)
• The flow of payments between bond issuers and investors is hitting snags as lawyers at banks and other intermediaries evaluate the risk of acting on behalf of companies with links to sanctioned Russians. (Financial Times) Goldman Sachs and Kirkland & Ellis put their relationship with private equity client Pamplona Capital Management on hold because of Pamplona’s links to a sanctioned oligarch’s investment group, LetterOne. (Financial Times)
• Baker McKenzie said its Kyiv office in Ukraine has resumed operations after the firm suspended work in the country following Russia’s invasion last month. It said the office’s premises are not available for visitors and meetings, but lawyers and administrative staff are providing services from the firm’s other locations in Ukraine and Europe. (Global Legal Post)

Lawyers, Law Firms

• Transactions work powered Milbank to its second straight year of double-digit growth in 2021. Its gross revenues rose 10% to about $1.36 billion, while average profits per equity partner jumped 12% to $5.033 billion. (American Lawyer)
• Another New York-based firm, Debevoise & Plimpton, had about $1.33 billion in revenue in 2021, up 8.5% from 2020, in its fifth-straight year of “top-of-market growth and profitably.” Its average PEP surged 10% to top $5 million for the first time. (American Lawyer) Washington-headquartered WilmerHale’s corporate, intellectual property litigation, and international arbitration practices contributed to revenues increasing 4.3% to nearly $1.3 billion. Its PEP expanded 10.8% to $2.808 million. Its profit margin was 53%, among the best in Big Law this year. (American Lawyer)
• Baker Botts and Choate Hall & Stewart joined firms matching the Cravath scale for associate pay. Fish & Richardson announced pay hikes that match the Cravath scale for associates who bill at least 2,000 hours and smaller raises for associates on a 1,900-hour track. Brown Rudnick announced below-market raises, plus Cravath-scale bonuses. (Above The Law)
• Wilson Sonsini signed a lease for 41,000 square feet in a new Boston office at One Boston Place. (Boston Business Journal)

Laterals, Moves, In-house

• Willkie Farr & Gallagher hired trial and appellate attorney Donald Burke in Washington as a partner. A former law clerk to late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Burke arrives from Robbins Russell; Akin Gump recruited international arbitration and commercial litigation partner Graham Lovett with his team from Gibson Dunn in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Holland & Knight added Jones Walker government relations attorney Elizabeth “Liz” Leoty Craddock, as a partner in Washington. Her earlier roles include vice president of government affairs for the International Association of Drilling Contractors, U.S. Senate legislative director and counsel. (HKLaw.com)
• Polsinelli hired two health-care attorneys as counsel in New York: a former associate at the firm, Sarah Kocher, who was recently associate counsel at the University of Rochester Medical Center, and health institution in-house veteran Jennifer Bolster, who was senior counsel at the Rochester University center. (Polsinelli.com)
• Nixon Peabody brought back entertainment lawyer Carron Joan Mitchell as a partner in Los Angeles. She was at the firm from 2016 to 2018 and was recently a partner at Hertz Lichtenstein & Young; Nixon Peabody appointed partner Rick Pedone as leader of its financial restructuring & bankruptcy team; Akerman said former King & Spalding finance and restructuring attorney Bryan Reese and former Simpson Thacher & Bartlett associate Cristina Gonzalez joined Akerman as corporate partners in New York. (Akerman)