Good afternoon,
US firms are running London's biggest deals. Latham & Watkins, Cleary Gottlieb, Gibson Dunn and Kirkland & Ellis all landed lead roles on KKR's £5.75bn take-private of FTSE 100 group DCC Energy. At the same time, Bloomberg Law reports Freshfields is losing EU partners to US rivals as its stateside buildout takes longer to pay off.
On the client side, private capital is chasing hard assets and recurring revenue. Blackstone, KKR and Brookfield are taking a 49% stake in Kuwait's pipeline network in a $16bn deal, and Carlyle and Bain Capital are fighting over $7bn wealth manager Wealth Enhancement. The Fed decides Wednesday with a rate hike back on the table, and Iran-US strikes paused for a second day.
Now, on to what matters for your practice today.
Today’s Talking Points
-US firms lead KKR's £5.75bn DCC Energy take-private; Freshfields loses EU partners to US rivals
-Laterals land at Fox Rothschild (corporate), Greenberg Traurig (litigation), Orrick (fintech), and Polsinelli (health care)
-Blackstone/KKR/Brookfield's $16bn Kuwait pipeline stake; Carlyle vs Bain for $7bn Wealth Enhancement
-Activists add AI adoption to the campaign playbook; Kirkland's Shaun Mathew flags the risk for financial firms
-Novo Nordisk seeks to enjoin Lilly's weight-loss ads; Tom Goldstein gets six years
-Central bank updates this week: Fed (Wed), BOJ and BOE (Thu), US Q2 GDP; Big Tech earnings; Iran-US strikes pause
Talent Strategy
Latest Moves
Fox Rothschild added corporate partner Marc Wagner in Washington, DC.
Greenberg Traurig hired litigator William Dorsey from Blank Rome as a shareholder across its Denver and New York offices.
Orrick brought on financial services and fintech partner Obrea Poindexter in Washington, DC.
Polsinelli added health care shareholder Michaela Poizner in Nashville.
What today's moves tell us: laterals spread across corporate, fintech, litigation and health care with firms adding regulatory-adjacent and transactional depth.
Operations and Strategy
US firms are pressing their advantage in cross-border work while UK rivals struggle to hold onto elite talent.
Bloomberg Law reports Freshfields is losing EU partners to US firms. Slow returns on its US buildout are straining the firm's ability to retain top continental attorneys and keep pace with better-paying US competitors, a reminder that platform investments carry a talent bill before they pay off.
The same US-firm advantage is visible in the deal market. American firms swept the lead roles on KKR's £5.75bn DCC Energy take-private, extending their grip on the largest UK public transactions and the fee pools that come with them. For UK firms, the pattern sharpens the pressure to match US pay and bench depth in London and on the continent.
Practices
Private Equity and Infrastructure
Sponsors are deploying into hard assets and recurring-revenue platforms, a sign dealmakers see a constructive window while financing holds. For Big Law, this points to concentrated M&A, financing, and regulatory work across energy infrastructure and wealth management, where cross-border structures and monetization of existing assets do most of the legal work.
Selected Press:
KKR takes DCC Energy private in a £5.75bn deal, with Latham, Cleary, Gibson Dunn and Kirkland leading — US firms controlling the biggest UK public transactions.
Blackstone, KKR and Brookfield buy 49% of Kuwait's pipeline network in a $16bn deal (~$8bn upfront), part of a Gulf push to monetize energy infrastructure through minority stakes.
Carlyle and Bain Capital battle for Wealth Enhancement (~$7bn, ~$160bn in client assets) in an Evercore-run process, extending PE's roll-up of registered investment advisers.
Corporate Governance and Activism
Activist investors are adding AI adoption to their campaign playbook. Kirkland's activism-defense head Shaun Mathew warns that financial firms which fail to show meaningful AI integration risk being targeted, a governance signal that boards will need defense strategy and disclosure counsel earlier than they expect.
Selected Press:
Activists press financial firms on AI adoption, per Kirkland's Shaun Mathew, as AI becomes a central campaign theme across sectors.
Litigation and Enforcement
Disputes are becoming a competitive tool. In pharma, Novo Nordisk is going to court to blunt Eli Lilly's marketing in a market headed above $100bn by 2030 tying false-advertising and IP work to commercial strategy.
Selected Press:
Novo Nordisk seeks a preliminary injunction to block Eli Lilly's weight-loss drug ads, alleging misleading dose comparisons, and is asking for corrective advertising.
Where the Work Sits
***
Private equity and infrastructure is the deepest pool this cycle. The DCC take-private, the Kuwait pipeline stake, and the Wealth Enhancement contest concentrate M&A, financing, and regulatory mandates on a small set of firms. Energy-infrastructure deals carry real cross-border and regulatory complexity, while recurring-revenue roll-ups such as RIAs feed sponsor-to-sponsor M&A and fund-level work. One deal in a sector tends to pull more behind it, and the current infrastructure pipeline points that way.
Antitrust and deal-defense teams sit at the center of the megadeal picture. A United-Delta exploration and Paramount's Warner Bros. pause would each run through extended merger review; the airline scenario in particular would be a multi-year engagement across filings, remedies, and litigation risk. The media delay is a reminder that regulatory exposure still sets deal calendars.
Litigation demand is running through commercial strategy. Novo Nordisk's move against Lilly turns marketing into a courtroom fight, generating false-advertising, IP, and injunction work in the obesity-drug market, and Micron's China exposure keeps export-control and trade advisory live. Enforcement mandates continue alongside, as the Goldstein sentencing shows.
Activism's new AI angle widens the governance workload. When campaigns escalate, board-defense and disclosure work branches quickly into proxy and M&A mandates, and financial-sector boards are the near-term targets.
Global Markets
Central banks and the Middle East dominate this week's risk map. Clients are positioning around a genuinely uncertain Fed that may be buying time before it is forced to make decision on rates. Capital allocators are also watching the Iran-US strike pause and Hormuz talks, which are easing oil and shaping energy and supply-chain planning.
Selected Press:
Fed announced rates Wednesday with markets pricing close to a 40% chance of a hike; US Q2 GDP and core PCE land Thursday.
Iran-US strikes pause for a second day as Hormuz talks progress and oil retreats, though the relief may be short-lived.
Singapore tightens policy again to curb imported inflation from high oil; CXMT raises $9.8bn in China's second-largest IPO.
Stories to Watch
Fed rate decision (Wednesday) — a hike is back on the table; the outcome sets refinancing and deal-financing windows through Q3.
Bank of Japan (Thu-Fri) and Bank of England (Thursday) — global rate divergence back in focus for cross-border financing.
US Q2 GDP and core PCE (Thursday) — growth and inflation reads feeding directly into the Fed's next move.
Big Tech earnings — Microsoft and Meta (Wednesday), Apple and Amazon (Thursday); watch AI capex and demand signals.
Iran-US strike pause and Hormuz talks — whether the truce holds and oil stays contained.
Novo Nordisk v. Eli Lilly injunction — a near-term test of how far pharma marketing fights will go.
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.
Thanks for reading!
We’d like your feedback. Please email thoughts and suggestions to [email protected].
