Power Points -Firm Prospects tracked nearly 16,000 moves in and out of the Am Law 200 in the first half of 2026. The headline number is small. What it tells you is not. For as long as anyone can remember, the BigLaw associate’s exit menu has been short and predictable, namely move to another firm,
Harvey Comes Calling As BigLaw Associates Trade the Billable Hour for “Legal Engineer” Read More »
Cahill Gordon & Reindel has become the first firm to match Milbank’s 2026 special bonuses in full, ending a summer-long standoff. The real question is whether anyone else moves before Cravath does. Cahill Gordon & Reindel has told associates it will match the special bonuses Milbank announced on July 27, making it the first firm
Cahill Blinks First -Two Months Later, BigLaw Finally Has a Milbank Bonus Match Read More »
Pinsent Masons has picked an insider with a significant growth record to take the top job, electing Richard Griffiths as its new Managing Partner from 1 November. Griffiths currently heads the multinational firm’s Property Group, which has grown 13 per cent over the past two years. Before that, he ran the Planning & Environment Practice,
UK Law – Pinsent Masons Appoints Insider To Top Job Read More »
Weil Gotshal’s extraordinary partner exodus is exposing an uncomfortable truth about the world’s richest law firms – they have spent years creating superstar rainmakers whose commercial power can sometimes rival the firms employing them. If a firm’s biggest rainmakers can walk away with their teams, expertise and potentially their clients, what exactly does the partnership
The $20 Million Partner Problem BigLaw Created With Rainmakers Bigger Than Their Firms Read More »
NEW YORK, September 25, 2026: International law firm Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP announced today that leading private equity lawyer Peter Feist will return to the Firm as a partner and U.S. Co-Head of its Private Equity practice, based in New York. Peter is a highly regarded private equity lawyer with more than 25 years of experience
Quinn Emanuel tops BTI’s most feared litigation list for the fifth straight year. The top sixteen firms haven’t budged. The only real movement is further down, where some “Awesome” firms are quietly being reclassified as merely “Intimidating.” A particular kind of silence falls over a general counsel’s office when the other side’s notice of appearance
The Fearsome Foursome Is Back. It’s the Same Four. Again. Read More »
Neel Sachdev is the best-paid finance lawyer in London, the most-discussed lateral hire of the decade, and possibly the only Big Law partner who has consulted an astrologer before hiring associates. He’s also been continuing to attract a lot of publicity lately.
Most partners at elite law firms prefer to be invisible outside a small circle of clients and headhunters. Neel Sachdev has taken a different approach. The Paul Weiss London co-head is the subject of a new Financial Times profile, and it may be the most entertaining piece of legal journalism this year.
The FT’s legal correspondent, Suzi Ring, met the 51-year-old lawyer in Portugal, where he has invested in a luxury property development on the site of a former orange grove in the Algarve. He did not arrive quietly, but rather in a red open-top 1977 Mercedes 450 SL, wearing a matching outfit, sunglasses and his trademark beaded bracelets.
The Consigliere in the Red Mercedes – Neel Sachdev, Big Law’s Leading Man Read More »
Vinson & Elkins (V&E) has recruited two senior finance lawyers from Latham & Watkins in New York, providing a major boost to its finance law group. Loren Finegold has taken the role as V&E’s new structured finance leader after 25 years at Latham & Watkins, where he was global vice chair of the structured finance
Vinson & Elkins Hire Senior Finance Lawyers from Latham & Watkins Read More »
Weil says it is not in merger talks. Read the sentence again, slowly Bloomberg Law reported on Friday that Weil, Gotshal & Manges, battered by an exodus of senior talent, is weighing options for its future that include a possible combination with a rival. Firm leaders have reportedly grown more receptive to the idea, and
Weil Gotshal Merger Talk: What Happens When You Lose 30 Partners And Your Rainmaker Read More »
15 September 2026 – Latest Update As of September 2026, first-year associates at market-rate US law firms earn a base salary of $235,000, rising to $455,000 by their eighth year. Add the standard market bonus and total compensation runs from roughly $261,000 to $595,000. The numbers come from the Milbank scale set in June 2026
Big Law Salary Scale 2026: NQ to Partner, Firm by Firm Read More »
