Christian is the Litigation Editor at The Lawyer, where he covers domestic and global disputes, as well as writing The Hearing and Disputes Signal. He also co-hosts and produces The Lawyer Podcast. Prior to joining The Lawyer, he worked at Times Radio. Christian was a commercial and sports disputes solicitor for several years in London and New Zealand before becoming a journalist.
The announcement that Herbert Smith Freehills would merge with US firm Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel has got chins wagging across the transatlantic market. But is this a new mega-firm in the vein of A&O Shearman, a shrewd building block for HSF to make advances in the US, or a bit of an anti-climax? What […]
Welcome to this week’s edition of The Hearing, your cheat sheet to the litigation market, bringing you the week’s top litigation stories and analysis. This is what’s driving the week. Merger fever: Merger fever has again gripped London as the market reacts to the news that Herbert Smith Freehills (HSF) is merging with US firm […]
New Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch has appointed One Essex Court’s Lord Wolfson KC as shadow attorney general. The senior silk is set to shadow Labour Attorney General Lord Hermer KC of Matrix Chambers, who was appointed by Prime Minister Keir Starmer the day after the election in July. Both men sit in the House […]
Welcome to The Hearing, your cheat sheet to the litigation market, bringing you the week’s top litigation stories and analysis. This is what’s driving the week. Budget priorities: Last week’s Budget promised a further £1.9bn in Justice spending. While the media is awash with stories on the dire state of prisons and the country’s Crown […]
White & Case on call for administrators of Air Berlin White & Case is on call for the administrators of Air Berlin in a general commercial contracts and arrangements claim against Big Four accountancy giant KPMG. Air Berlin was a major German airline before it filed for insolvency in August 2017 after its largest shareholder, […]
This is a moment of change for the European legal market. With firms like Kirkland & Ellis and Paul Hastings making major recent moves in the EU, the US elite are starting to seriously disrupt the European order. This is most visible in Germany, France and the Nordics. On this episode of The Lawyer Podcast, […]
Welcome to this week’s edition of The Hearing, your cheat sheet to the litigation market, bringing you the week’s top litigation stories and analysis. In the bad books: The release of the Legal Services Board’s (LSB) report into the Solicitors Regulation Authority’s (SRA) handling of Axiom Ince’s collapse caused a storm on Tuesday. The LSB, […]
As the US finds itself in the grip of an electoral storm, there is another American battle you should be watching. This is the story of the race to be the global king of litigation. For more than a decade, Kirkland & Ellis and Quinn Emanuel have been locked in a battle to claim the […]
Welcome to this week’s edition of The Hearing, your cheat sheet to the litigation market, bringing you the week’s top litigation stories and analysis. Breadcrumbs: We may have received a clue as to the Solicitor Regulation Authority’s (SRA) next steps in the Post Office Horizon and Axiom Ince scandals. The organisation has been under intense […]
A&O Shearman is to establish a three-tier partnership compensation model. The firm adopted an all-equity partnership model after legacy A&O and legacy Shearman & Sterling merged in May this year. The three tiers, reportedly called “entry,” “core” and “super,” replace the legacy firms’ mixed equity and non-equity structures. The firm says it has around 800 […]
In our latest podcast celebrating the 20th edition of The Lawyer’s UK 200, editors Catrin Griffiths, Christian Smith, Matt Byrne, Katy Dowell and Richard Simmons are back to reveal the five firms they are watching in the coming years – for good or for ill. With a list of 200 law firms, it’s not difficult […]
The Premier League is considering challenging a tribunal decision that threw out its disciplinary case against Leicester City FC this year, The Lawyer can reveal. The League, represented by Blackstone Chambers’ co-head of chambers Jane Mulcahy KC and Linklaters’ partner Ben Carroll, had brought disciplinary proceedings against the 2016 champions for breaches of its profit […]