Linklaters Surpasses £2 Billion Revenue Mark for a Record Year

UK firm Linklaters reports its highest ever revenue and pre-tax profits as the deals market counters inflation, high interest rates and tight credit.

The firm’s revenue hit £2.1 billion ($2.69 billion) in the financial year ended April 30, 10% more than the previous year. It reported increases in pre-tax profits, profit per partners and profit per equity partner. Overall pre-tax profits hit approximately £942 million ($1.2 billion), 10% more than the previous year.

“Since Christmas, when the public markets opened up in a lot of places, we’ve been on a really good run of clients trusting us with the biggest, most complex mandates, and the ones that hit the headlines,” said Linklaters’ firmwide managing partner Paul Lewis.

The results speak to growth amid a slow deals market and an active lateral hiring market, which has seen several departures from Linklaters. Those include four partners, Matthew Hearn, Dan Schuster-Woldan, Nicole Kar and Will Aitken-Davies, that were poached by Paul Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison over the months since September.

US Growth

Linklaters’ record revenue can be attributed partially to the US market, where it delivered a 24% increase in revenue.

The London “Magic Circle” firm ranked 8 in Bloomberg Law’s M&A league tables, placing it among top US Big Law firms and surpassing Davis Polk & Wardwell and Sullivan & Cromwell with $83.2 billion in deal volume for the first half of 2024, according to Bloomberg data.

In January, Linklaters hired George Casey and a team of five M&A lawyers from Shearman & Sterling ahead of its merger with peer UK firm Allen & Overy to form A&O Shearman. Casey was a partner at Shearman for more than 20 years and joined as Linklaters’ global co-chair of its corporate practice. “We’re incredibly pleased with how that’s worked,” said Lewis.

The firm has continued plans to grow in the US by adding more in M&A and around restructuring, insolvency, finance, capital markets and litigation, said Lewis.

“It’s a highly competitive market, in particular in New York, trying to attract the right people is not an easy process,” he said.

China Market

The firm will also continue to invest in the Chinese market, even as China’s deteriorating political relations with the US and heightened regulation have driven Big Law firms to scale back in the region.

The firm has particularly seen success in Asia energy transition projects, including advising developers on the Hai Long offshore wind farm project in Taiwan last year.

Linklaters last year laid off lawyers in Asia in response to a downturn in the market.

Morrison Foerster, Orrick Herrington & Sutcliffe, Baker Botts, McDermott Will & Emery, Vinson & Elkins and Latham & Watkins have closed at least one China office since 2020. Mayer Brown said in May it was breaking away from its offices in Hong Kong, and Dentons last year separated from its China arm.

“We’ve made the changes we think we need to make and we’re keeping an eye on the geopolitical aspect of things, but it’s an important market for us,” said Lewis.