Anthony Matthews
12 March 2026
Background
In the 70’s & 80’s, most US firms had an office in London but it was never really more than an outpost for some UK and European work as the magic circle firms dominated the UK market. 50 years on, the US firms have some of the largest and most profitable offices in the City, paying huge salaries to associates and ginormous salaries to partners.
Moving through the 2000’s and 2010’s, we saw huge growth from some of the US biggest names, mainly driven by two – Latham & Watkins and Kirkland & Ellis. Sitting on either side of Bishopsgate, these firms steadily grew, recruiting the top partners and teams from London’s established firms. As they had done in the US, these two firms adopted the non-Wall Street approach to expansion, taking non-traditional risks and exploiting new markets as areas like private equity continued to grow.
Growth
So why is London so attractive for US firms? London provides an ideal English speaking entry point to the European markets and a common law footing in a central time zone. Much of the projects work in the Middle East and North Africa can also run from London in a more secure geopolitical location.
London also has a plethora of some of the best trained junior lawyers and with US firms offering such inflated salaries compared to their UK counterparts, it is easier to attract silver circle and magic circle associates & partners.
US firms London offices now occupy many of the top 50 places in terms of UK revenue and profit and it seems like they are here to stay. With many US firms also merging with UK practices, it seems as time goes on, we will see a much closer alignment between Anglo & American firms.
Outside of the traditional, high profit growth areas such as private equity, many of the US firms now offer much more of a full service offering to clients meaning that areas such as real estate, employment and disputes are now entrenched in US practices.
Effect on the London Market
The headline change that this has made to London is with regards to remuneration. New York by far, pays more than any other legal market in the world and this has been reflected in London. A good way of looking at this would be NQ salaries. In 2013, the NQ salary for a US firm was around £100,000, 12 years later this is at £170-180,000. As these have risen, it has dragged the rest of the firms in London with it. Compare this to another strong European legal hub with very little US firm presence, Dublin. NQ salaries in Dublin have remained relatively consistent and now stand around €75-80,000 (£65-70,000). The discrepancy can also been seen with firms in other cities in the UK. The best paying firm outside of London is Simmons & Simmons in Bristol which pays £96,000 at NQ however, most firms in locations such as Leeds, Edinburgh etc. pay around £60-£70,000 at NQ.
At the partner level, these remuneration packages comfortably go into the millions with the top partners with US firms in London reportedly on up to £20,000,000 a year! This has resulted in a much higher movement of partners in London including some partners leaving partnership structures which were considered Fort Knox such as Slaughter and May and Macfarlanes. With a number of clients following partners, especially within private equity where partner/client relationships are often more personal than institutional, this can mean that firms can lose huge chunks of revenue and vice versa, new firms accrue this revenue meaning that the perceived strength of firms can change dramatically.
Future
New York continues to look to London as a place to expand a firm. Over the last 24 months, we’ve seen the rise and rise of Paul Weiss as well as high levels of growth at Gibson Dunn & Sullivan & Cromwell.
At the same time, we have seen some US brands merge with UK firms, some from positions of strength and others, not so much. Cadwalader, Winston & Strawn, Shearman & Sterling and Perkins Coie all now have a UK/international counterpart to the firm and it will be interesting to see if more US firms across the Atlantic look at growth strategy through these means.
We can see the US style of partnership structure start to become evident in the UK as well now with UK stalwarts like Freshfields adopting the salaried partnership structure alongside the equity model. This is likely to lead to an evermore competitive recruitment market at all levels as ‘lifers’ at firms become rarer and rarer.
Anthony P Matthews