The Legal 500

Germany

The German legal market has not been immune to the dramatic fallout from the sub-prime crisis. Consequentially there is a lack of confidence in the market. This has impacted on deal flows and law firms have noticed that many deals have been aborted, while many sources of funding have dried up considerably.Read more...

France

The economic slowdown did not prevent leading and mid-size law firms in France from posting strong results in 2008, with many firms even exceeding what they achieved in 2007.

A number of international law firms are now focusing on their core business areas at the expense of ancillary practices. As a result, a number of lateral moves occurred in 2008.

Portugal

The past year has helped to measure the initial success of the numerous mergers witnessed in 2007, when Portugal’s legal market appeared to adopt a ‘bigger is better’ approach. While some firms have emerged stronger than before, others have had to come to terms with perhaps less fruitful attempts at expansion, resulting in a series of spin-offs and demergers.Read more...

Ukraine

Serhiy Chorny heads the highly rated four-partner team at Baker & McKenzie – CIS, Limited. Recently the practice advised PrivatBank, Ukraine’s largest commercial bank, on the $110m securitisation of an autoloans portfolio, the first of its kind in Ukraine. Other clients include IFC, ING Bank and Standard Bank, which it advised on a $154m syndicated loan to First Ukrainian International Bank.Read more...

Iceland

Everything has changed in the Icelandic legal market. Following the credit crunch-induced economic implosion in late 2008, the jurisdiction’s small corporate legal community have been forced to shift their focus almost overnight from supporting rapid, heady economic growth, built primarily on the perceived success of Iceland’s banking and financial sector, to becoming what one lawyer termed ‘firemen’, providing urgent advice to a crisis-stricken banking and business community.Read more...

Switzerland

The legal market in Switzerland has remained largely unchanged over the past 20 years. Local firms still dominate the legal market. Well established domestic heavyweights such as 0Lenz & Staehelin, Bär & Karrer AG, Python & Peter and Schellenberg Wittmer remain the prominent players. With offices in Geneva and Zurich, Baker & McKenzie is one of the few international firms to successfully break into the marketplace. In 2008 there was some significant mergers in with mid-sized firms acquiring offices in Basel, namely Bratschi Wiederkehr & Buob merging with Wagner Meili Berger and Kellerhals Attorneys at Law merging with Christen Rickli Partner.Read more...

South Africa

The last three years have seen an unprecedented transformation of South Africa’s legal market. As global law firms complete mergers with local practices (Eversheds LLP with Routledge Modise Eversheds; and DLA Piper UK LLP with Cliffe Dekker Inc), South African firms are themselves looking to consolidate and merge in order to compete both locally and on the larger international stage.Read more...

Greece

Greece has enjoyed a prolonged period of growth, averaging about 4% a year since its admittance to the euro-area economy, thanks in no small part to a drop in borrowing costs and a credit boom. The shipping industry, historically Greece’s dominant market sector, also benefited from easy access to finance, with many of the major Greek shipping companies opting to list on the New York and London stock exchanges as a result of this unprecedented boom. However, the outlook has turned decidedly less certain, with Greece already feeling the effects of the global economic slowdown, resulting in shrinking commercial property and capital markets sectors. Read more...

Turkey

The long economic bull run that came to an end in 2008 has been a boon to Turkey’s main commercial law firms, and had a considerable impact on the shape and form of the legal market. Traditional family run firms with tightly held equity partnerships that have existed since the 1960s and 1970s, or even earlier, have started to fracture, as more ambitious partners and senior associates set up their own practices. These new firms are now slowly coming to the fore. Read more...

Slovakia

Since joining the European Union in 2004 the Slovakian economy has been in growth mode, attracting a steady flow of investment from multinationals setting up operations serving the whole of Central and Eastern Europe from the country. Low labour costs, low taxes and political stability have combined to make Slovakia one of the most attractive destinations for foreign direct investment in Europe, and the government’s decision to join the Euro on 1 January 2009 has only furthered the country’s growth trajectory in spite of the global economic downturn that took hold elsewhere in 2008. Read more...

Nigeria

The Nigerian legal market is heavily balkanised, there being a host of small but experienced firms able to handle complex deals or disputes. Even the largest firms are small by international standards, and there is a heavy reliance on the name and connections of one or two senior partners.

Of the international firms, the UK’s Magic Circle appears most frequently in Nigeria’s projects and telecoms deals, but there are a host of other international firms which also have extensive Nigeria-related experience. Read more...