Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer has broken the £1m profits per equity partner (PEP) figure for the first time, while turnover at the magic circle firm stands just short of £1bn.
Provisional figures from the magic circle firm show PEP is up 25% from the £830,000 mark last year, with each of the firm’s partners pocketing on average £1,036,000. Meanwhile, the firm billed £987m, a 12% increase on last year’s figure of £882m.
Total profits, meanwhile, have risen 13% to £491m, up from a figure of £433m last year.
Although the cost of the restructuring looks to have hit Freshfields’ bottom line, the now diminished pool of equity partners combined with a series of big-ticket mandates looks set to raise the firm’s PEP figure significantly.
During the last financial year, Freshfields has gone through a period of major restructuring, which has seen its number of equity partners drop from around 500 in May last year to approximately 420 at the beginning of this month.
Freshfields’ results follow the announcement yesterday (29 May) that magic circle rival Clifford Chance has broken the £1m PEP barrier after unveiling a 25% increase to an average of £1,015,000 – almost equal to Freshfields’ figure.
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