Magic circle Clifford Chance equity partners pocket over £2m
Magic circle law firm Clifford Chance’s revenue had double-digit growth as it reports its highest rate of revenue increase since 2017, with the firm tipping this to its investment in the US.
Over the last financial year, the firm’s revenue went up by 11 per cent, from £2.06bn the year that saw it surpass £2bn for the first time, to £2.3bn.
While its profits leapt by nearly 10 per cent to £856m, up from £781m over 2022/23, which was down from the previous year of £783m.
The equity partners of Clifford Chance also took home £2.04m, slightly up on the £2m they reportedly received last year.
Global managing partner, Charles Adams stated that “our record profits have enabled us to make substantial investments in our global team and operations”.
He added: “These strategic investments are already yielding benefits for our clients and our firm and position us for long-term success.”
Over the full year of 2024, a total of 19 partners joined Clifford Chance in New York, Houston and Washington DC across a broad offering of complex M&A, antitrust, restructuring and insolvency, leveraged finance, tax and real estate advice. This investment takes the total number of partners in the US to 115.
With that, the ongoing investment into the US drove a 28 per cent surge in its revenue. While the firm further consolidated in Europe including the UK, and in the Middle East, all recording strong high single digit growth. Additionally, it performed solidly across APAC “despite subdued market activity in some parts of the region”.
Adams noted: “We are making great progress everywhere but fastest in the US.”
In terms of its practice areas, it was litigation that drove the revenue growth as its global litigation and disputes resolution and regulatory investigations teams grew revenue by 20 per cent, and now represent more than 20 per cent of total firm income.
“All practice areas delivered strong growth, particularly our litigation teams, which had another exceptional year,” stated Adams.
The firm representing former CEO of Autonomy Mike Lynch in his defence against accusations of securities and wire fraud in a 12-week criminal trial in Federal Court, who was acquitted in June.
It was also involved and successfully defended BT/EE, in a case brought against them by Phones 4u, which involved allegations of anti-competitive collusion by major UK mobile network operators.
However, the firm advised on 224 M&A deals during 2023, with a value of US$208bn, “with strong momentum continuing into the second half of FY24”.
Additionally, Clifford Chance advised Virgin Money on its takeover by Nationwide Building Society for £2.9bn and advised on the financing for Cinven’s public acquisition offer for SYNLAB.
Clifford Chance said it was one of the first organisations globally to deploy a fully integrated suite of private and secured AI tools at scale, digitally empowering its 7,000 strong global workforce within its published global AI policy.