Partner Profits at Latham Are Down 21%, but ‘Not Too Shabby,’ Chairman Says
When Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft reported a decline of 30 percent in partner profits, its chairman W. Christopher White noted that average profits per equity partner stood at $1.88 million.
The figure is “not too shabby,” White told the Am Law Daily at the time.
Now another law firm leader is using the same phrase to describe partner profits at his firm, Latham & Watkins. Profits dropped 21 percent last year, one of the highest reported drops in 2008, the Am Law Daily reports. Profits per equity partner plunged from $2.27 million in 2007 to $1.8 million in 2008, the story says. Revenues at the firm dropped by 4 percent, putting the firm back below the $2 billion mark.
Latham chairman Robert Dell told the Am Law Daily that $1.8 million in profits per partner is “not too shabby” and points out that the firm’s 2008 performance was still the second-best in its history.
The firm continues to represent high-profile clients and is investing in overseas operations, opening new offices last year in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Qatar. “We’re in most of the markets we need to be, and our global footprint was very helpful in 2008,” Dell told the Am Law Daily.
