Anthony Matthews
7 July 2026
The traditional British summer of one week being 35C and sunny and the next 15C and raining is in full flow and many in the City are looking towards the traditional summer break across August. Although processes slow down, the legal market does not take much of a break and recruitment levels remain consistent across the board.
Salary Updates
The big news on the salary front over the last quarter is Milbank setting the pace in New York once more by slightly improving their salaries meaning that 1st year associates now get paid $235,000 - https://abovethelaw.com/2026/06/alert-milbank-does-it-again-associate-salaries-are-going-up/ . Not all firms in New York have matched this with a few shrugging it off as a PR stunt by Milbank in their long running remuneration rivalry with Cravath. This may lead to other firms beating Milbank on the bonus front come Christmas to cover the increase.
Although this should be a benefit to lawyers working with US firms in London, the exchange rate changes that have occurred over the last year or so have left associates who are being paid Cravath Scale equivalent in London worse off. For example, at the beginning of 2025, the NQ salary for someone being paid Cravath Scale was around £180,000, this is now much closer to £170,000.
In contrast, US firms that don’t pay Cravath Scale and instead pay their own rate in London are quite a bit ahead now. Quinn Emanuel for example, has once again increased their salaries meaning that NQs with the disputes boutique will no earn a whopping £189,000 at NQ, rising to £300,000+ at 5PQE - https://www.legalcheek.com/2026/06/quinn-emanuel-sets-new-london-nq-lawyer-salary-record-raising-pay-to-189k/ . In all the locations they work in, Quinn like to be top of the market in pay. With revenue at the disputes boutique constantly on the rise, they have a little more flexibility to do this compared to full service firms.
With UK firms, there does seem to be an unexpected movement with the top-tier and silver circle firms as Macfarlanes raised NQ salaries to £150,000 matching the magic circle! When pay rose across the board in the City a few years ago, this was kicked off with the silver circle upping rates so we would expect others to raise their NQ salaries at the very least. With the magic circle, it is often A&O and Clifford Chance who jump first so will be interesting to see if they push up rates. One would expect the magic circle to move to wither £155,000 or £160,000 which would put them within £10,000 of US firms paying Cravath on current exchange rates.
NQ Retention
Early signs are showing that the September intake for this year is going to be quite brutal with a lot of trainees either not being kept on or accepting roles in areas which are not their first choice. Areas like technology & litigation remain some of the most popular with trainees but roles are few and far between.
The majority of lateral NQ recruitment comes from the US firms but within their core areas such as funds, private equity or leveraged finance. With more US firms taking on trainees in the coming years, unfortunately the NQ market is going to get more and more squeezed and lateral roles will become even fewer and further between.
Evolving Partnership Promotions
Partnership promotions are also being announced over the City. Generally speaking, the number of partners being made up at UK firms is down and this corresponds with lower NQ retention rate as well, firms are a little quieter, albeit keeping up profits.
With the US firms, it can be hard to sift through the numbers as a number of US firms are changing their partnership tiers to bring in the salaried partner element. Once the dust has settled on the salaried partner side of things, it’s looking like around 7 in 10 US firms will have this level of partnership.
Mergers
Towards the end of last year, all the talk in the press was about the many mergers being revealed. Following partner votes, a number of these are now coming live creating new names in the global legal market such as Winston Taylor - https://www.nonbillable.co.uk/news/winston-taylor-launches-merger-goes-live , Ashurst Perkins Coie and Hogan Lovells Cadwalader (not as catchy). As with any merger, this can create movement at all levels with unhappy partners and associates. It will be interesting to see how these mergers bed in as the US/UK tie up can not always be very easy especially on the salary front!
Wishing you all a lovely summer break when it comes / not too cold winter in the Southern Hemisphere!