Good afternoon,
US law firms are heading for a profit bump. Second-quarter billing rates rose 7% and demand rose 3%, per the Thomson Reuters Institute. Fresh laterals landed at Paul Weiss in capital markets, King & Spalding and Paul Hastings in restructuring, and Sheppard Mullin in trials, while Illinois became the second state to curb outside investors in law firms.
On the client side, Wall Street is racing to fund AI. Nvidia lined up a $500bn financing alliance with six private-equity and bank giants including Apollo, Blackstone, BlackRock, Brookfield, KKR and Goldman. Anthropic tied up with Macquarie and GIC on data centers, and Intel launched its first stock sale in 55 years. GameStop may drop its $56bn eBay bid, oil jumped toward $86 on Iran, and July CPI lands this week.
Now, on to what matters for your practice today.
Today’s Talking Points
-Law firm profits set to rise: Q2 billing rates +7%, demand +3% (Thomson Reuters); laterals hit Paul Weiss, King & Spalding, and Paul Hastings
-Illinois becomes the second state to limit outside investment in law firms as the MSO debate widens
-Nvidia lines up a $500bn AI-financing alliance with Apollo, Blackstone, BlackRock, Brookfield, KKR, and Goldman; can backstop up to 25%
-Anthropic launches the Theseus data-center venture with Macquarie and GIC; SEC exempts data-center bonds from securitization rules
-Intel launches its first stock sale in 55 years ($15bn–$20bn); OpenAI buys back $7bn of employee shares at an $852bn valuation
-PE is stuck with 33,575 unsold businesses; GameStop weighs pulling its $56bn eBay bid
-9th Circuit clears thousands of social-media addiction suits against Meta, Google, and TikTok; Adani criminal case dismissed
-US shifts from tariffs to supply-chain curbs on China; oil nears $86 as Iran deal hopes fade
Talent Strategy
Latest Moves
Paul Weiss added Peter Byrne and Tristan VanDeventer as partners in its Capital Markets Group within the Corporate Department in New York.
King & Spalding hired Jonathan Ching and Andrew Kummer as partners in its finance and restructuring practice in New York.
Paul Hastings added Bevis Metcalfe and Kieran Sharma as partners in its financial restructuring practice in London; chair Frank Lopez calls London and Europe restructuring a strategic priority.
Sheppard Mullin brought on Kevin Cyrulnik as a partner in its business trial practice in New York.
Hogan Lovells Cadwalader added Eric Fishman as US sports and entertainment lead in New York.
BCLP hired Rafi Azim-Khan for its global technology, commercial and data practice across London and San Francisco.
What today's moves tell us: firms are stacking specialist benches in capital markets and restructuring, and London restructuring is now a declared priority for Am Law firms.
Operations and Strategy
Legal demand is solid and rates are climbing, but the bigger structural question regarding how much outside capital a partnership can take, is getting some answers on a state by state basis.
US firms are on track for a profit boost. Billing rates rose 7% in the second quarter and hours worked rose 3%, per the Thomson Reuters Institute's Law Firm Financial Index. Litigation led AM Law 200 lateral hiring over the same period, a reminder that disputes remain the deepest well of billable demand.
Illinois became the second state to limit outside investors' role in law firms, even as interest in lawyer-investor structures grows. It is a counterweight to Arizona and Texas, which have opened the door to management services organizations. Management committees weighing private-equity money now face a widening state-by-state patchwork.
In the UK, Gowling WLG's new UK chief executive Chris Towle set out a plan of continuity over revolution, integrating the global platform around key sectors. Elsewhere, magic-circle fees are on show: Slaughter and May and Freshfields are each in line for more than £10m from the £4.1bn Rotork-ABB deal.
Practices
AI Infrastructure Finance and Capital Markets
The AI buildout is bringing Wall Street together, and the legal advisory mandates will keep partners busy. Dealmakers, fund managers, and their counsel are positioning for debt structuring, joint-venture formation, and securities work as Wall Street commits historic sums to compute. With the SEC easing securitization rules for data-center bonds and equity issuance running at records, capital-markets and finance teams are the clear near-term winners.
Selected Press:
Nvidia lined up a preliminary $500bn financing alliance with Apollo, Blackstone, BlackRock, Brookfield, KKR, and Goldman Sachs to help AI companies raise cheaper debt for chips and data centers; Nvidia can backstop up to 25% of any project.
Anthropic, Macquarie Asset Management, and GIC launched Theseus Infrastructure to build and lease US AI data centers, with Macquarie and GIC funding most of the equity.
SEC exempted data-center bonds from key securitization rules, easing a fast-growing funding channel.
Intel launched its first stock sale in 55 years, reported at $15bn–20bn, to fund chip packaging and “purpose-built silicon”; Cloudflare is selling $2.2bn of convertibles and IBM raised $2bn.
OpenAI bought back about $7bn of employee shares at an $852bn valuation.
M&A, Private Equity, and Exits
Sponsors are sitting on a record backlog of unsold companies even as strategics keep signing. The gap between a busy deal tape and stalled exits is generating sell-side, carve-out, and fund-liquidity mandates, and executives are watching financing costs and valuations before committing. Private-credit strain adds a restructuring watch behind the deal flow.
Selected Press:
Private equity is stuck with 33,575 unsold portfolio businesses, per the NYT, keeping pressure on exits and continuation vehicles.
GameStop is weighing withdrawing its $56bn bid for eBay and may propose a partnership instead.
Newmont agreed to pay Barrick $1.95bn to reshape their Nevada gold JV, paving the way for Barrick's planned IPO of its North America gold assets.
Samsung SDI will buy out GM's 50% stake in their $3.5bn Indiana EV-battery JV; Teledyne will buy Varex Imaging for $1.1bn; Jazz Pharmaceuticals will acquire Actio Biosciences for $1.3bn.
Archer Aviation will acquire Boeing's Wisk, SkyGrid, and Insitu units for a 20% stake, consolidating flying-taxi and drone tech.
777 Partners filed for Chapter 11, and a Glencore-led consortium proposed a rescue of miner Sherritt International.
Litigation, Regulatory, and Trade
A busy docket is reopening several mass-tort and antitrust fronts, and general counsel are recalibrating exposure. The 9th Circuit's green light for social-media addiction suits, a new college-admissions class action, and stepped-up US supply-chain curbs on China point to sustained product-liability, antitrust, and trade-compliance work.
Selected Press:
9th Circuit cleared thousands of addiction lawsuits against Meta, Google, TikTok, and others to proceed.
A federal judge ruled 32 universities, including Duke, Cornell, and Northwestern, must face a class action over “early decision” tuition pricing.
A US judge dismissed the criminal securities-fraud case against Adani's Gautam Adani.
Washington shifted from tariffs to targeted curbs on China, including polysilicon price floors, FCC import bans, and a draft order on Chinese data-center components, alongside $3bn in critical-minerals investment.
Patent suits multiplied: Navitas sued Renesas, and Rippling sued AI startup Runlayer.
Where the Work Sits
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Today’s clearest fee pool is in AI-infrastructure finance. Nvidia’s $500bn alliance, the Anthropic-Macquarie-GIC venture, and the SEC’s securitization relief route work to capital-markets, structured-finance, and project-finance teams structuring, placing, and documenting compute debt, with power, real estate, and offtake questions sitting beside every build. As liability-management conversations return, large future maturities tend to shape advisory demand well before the debt comes due.
The record overhang of unsold sponsor assets points to PE exits, continuation-vehicle, and secondary mandates, while strategic deals like Newmont-Barrick and Archer-Boeing keep M&A, carve-out, and antitrust teams busy. Private-credit strain adds restructuring and workout work behind the deal flow.
Litigation is also broadening. The 9th Circuit’s social-media ruling drives product-liability and Multidistrict Litigation work; the college-admissions class action extends antitrust exposure into new sectors; and Washington’s China supply-chain curbs generate sanctions, export-control, and trade-compliance mandates.
London restructuring is a declared growth lane, with US firms building benches for European liability management and cross-border workouts as maturity walls approach.
Global Markets
Fading Iran-deal hopes and a firmer oil price meet a softer inflation read, keeping the Fed’s path the key swing factor.
Clients are watching whether higher oil and a stalled Hormuz negotiation feed back into inflation just as July CPI is expected to ease. Finance Chiefs are weighing financing windows against record gold and stretched equity valuations, while sponsors track the yen and China trade friction for cross-border timing.
Selected Press:
Oil jumped toward $86 as Trump demanded Iran pay reparations, dimming hopes of a quick Strait of Hormuz deal.
July CPI, due this week, is expected to show inflation easing, the key read before the Fed’s next move.
Gold hit a nine-week high as investors abandoned hedges to chase equities; EM valuations fell below half the S&P 500’s.
China ordered 54% levies on US pecans ahead of an expected Xi-Trump summit; Australia’s RBA held rates.
Stories to Watch
US July CPI (this week) — expected to ease; the key read before the Fed’s next move.
Nvidia’s $500bn AI-financing alliance — watch which lenders finalize and how backstops are structured; a template for compute debt.
Strait of Hormuz talks — Trump’s reparations demand keeps oil near $86 and energy boards on alert.
US crypto market-structure bill — stalled into September after the Senate punted; a test for digital-asset legislation.
Intel’s stock sale ($15bn–20bn) — a gauge of investor appetite amid record US equity issuance.
Illinois and the MSO map — more states drawing lines on outside investment in law firms.
That’s the rundown. See you next where law meets the markets.
-The BigLaw Markets Team
*DISCLAIMER: BigLaw Markets analyzes publicly available information, filings, press releases, and news stories published by reputable media sources to deliver newsletters that highlight the drivers of demand for legal services.
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