Cravath

Associate Bonus Watch: Which Firms Are Springing Only in New York?

By

Let’s all take a deep breath. Associate bonus season, which usually wraps up sometime in January, looks like it’s been extended well into April. This is just more proof that Biglaw firms don’t actually collude. No rational business person would want to be making decisions in April 2011 about how much to pay employees for 2010 performance.

For those trying to keep score, there seem to be the following categories of firms (roughly using a letter-grade system):

A – Firms that are paying Cravath-level spring bonuses in all offices. (Example: Cravath.) [FN1]
B – Firms that are paying Sullivan & Cromwell-level spring bonuses in all offices. (Example: S&C.)
C – Firms that are paying spring bonuses in New York but not elsewhere, like California or D.C.. (Example: Read more below.)
D – Firms that are not paying spring bonuses because their year-end bonuses beat the Cravath year-end bonuses, and they’re hoping their associates can’t add. (Example: CHECK YOU QUINN EMANUEL.)
F – Firms that are not paying spring bonuses and invite disgruntled associates to S some D if they don’t like it. (Example: Jones “We can still hear all the poors who live inside your black box” Day.)

Right now, we want to focus on Group C. Group B gets a pass because they started the spring bonus phenomenon and goddamnit we’re going to respect that. Partners at firms in Groups D & F will have to examine their own motives for why they want their associates to secretly hate them.

But Group C is weird. Why create inter-office jealousy and rage when most top firms are paying spring bonuses in all of their offices? Why look that desperate to save a little bit of money?

And you can’t spell “Weird Cost-Cutting” without White & Case…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Which Firms Are Springing Only in New York?”

42 Comments

Ex-Associate at Three Top Firms Charged With Massive Insider Trading

By

Matthew Kluger

There’s no contest today for Lawyer of the Day honors. The clear winner is Matthew Kluger, a former associate at three leading law firms, who has been charged in a massive insider trading case. Kluger stands accused of reaping more than $32 million in profit over the course of a 17-year conspiracy, which also allegedly involved a trader, Garrett Bauer. (Kluger and Bauer might not be as big as Raj Rajaratnam, who’s pretty hefty, but their supposed scheme is nothing to scoff at.)

The charges were filed by Paul Fishman, U.S. Attorney for New Jersey (disclosure: my former office). Fishman claims that Matt Kluger passed along insider information that eventually made its way, via an unnamed co-conspirator, to Garrett Bauer, who traded on it. According to the complaint, Kluger and Bauer invested more than $109 million in the scheme, which yielded profits of more than $32.2 million.

Where did Kluger allegedly obtain the inside information? From the three Biglaw firms where he once worked on M&A deals….

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Ex-Associate at Three Top Firms Charged With Massive Insider Trading”

75 Comments

Non-Sequiturs: 04.04.11

By

* Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will be tried by a military commission at Guantanamo, but John Yoo is still not satisfied. He wants to capture people and hold them indefinitely without trial proof that the Obama Administration can conduct terror trials successfully. Obviously, the elegant solution is to make KSM live in Yoo’s basement until one of them begs for an impartial arbiter. [Ricochet]

* If you ever read the warnings on your prescriptions, I think this is what you’ll see (by Jeremy Blachman). [McSweeney]

* There is an epidemic of people slamming automobiles into legal structures. [ABA Journal]

* Stephen Colbert interviews a former Cravath attorney, Roy Den Hollander. I wish Colbert would do a “better know a law firm” series. [The Careerist]

* From Skadden to Dickstein Shapiro to stay-at-home mom. [But I Do Have A Law Degree...]

* This April Fool’s Blawg Review is no joke. [Fools in the Forest via Blawg Review]

* How would you describe a typical day in the life of an associate? (Hint: it’s a trick question.) [YouTube via Schola2Juris]

53 Comments

ATL March Madness: The Coolest Law Firm Final Four

By

There haven’t been any VCU-style upsets in our Coolest Law Firm Bracket. That’s probably because lawyers don’t like upsets. Lawyers get paid to make sure no “surprises” happen; lawyers like things to proceed in a predictable and organized fashion. Sure, Davis Polk (ranked #5 by Vault) topped Skadden (ranked #4) in the Elite Eight. But the real surprise there is that the gargantuan-sized Skadden couldn’t whip up enough of its own people to vote it through to the next round.

As we move into the Final Four, we’ve got some intriguing match-ups. On one side of the bracket, people will have to choose whether or not making money is cooler than being attractive. On the other side of the bracket, we’ll answer the question: Is being “first” more important than being “best”?

Let’s get to it…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “ATL March Madness: The Coolest Law Firm Final Four”

38 Comments

ATL March Madness: The Coolest Law Firm Elite Eight

By

We will have a new winner in this year’s Coolest Law Firm contest. When Above the Law first ran this bracket back in 2008, you picked Latham & Watkins as the victor. This time around, they got… Lathamed, in the first round. Cravath crushed Latham by a 60% – 40% margin. That was the second-highest margin of victory among all of the first-round match-ups.

So, for those playing along at home, paying a spring bonus is “more cool” than not paying a spring bonus.

As we move into the Elite Eight, some of our readers are asking us to give a more clear definition of what is “cool.” We respectfully decline to do so. It’s up to you to tell us what makes a top law firm cool. Is it job security, making maximum bank, prestige points? It’s really up to you. Personally I think the coolest law firm would be the one most likely to represent bad-ass clients on the correct side of moral issues, but… eeek, that’s not really what Biglaw is all about.

So bring your own prejudices to the table when you vote in the next round of the Coolest Law Firm Tournament. Use whatever reasoning makes sense to you. Just don’t go with chalk because you can’t be bothered to actually form an opinion — don’t be boring, son….

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “ATL March Madness: The Coolest Law Firm Elite Eight”

32 Comments

Associate Bonus Watch: Simpson Raises to Cravath Spring Bonus Scale

By

In a postcript to our detailed post speculating about the future direction of the spring bonus phenomenon, we noted “an isolated report of one firm on the S&C spring bonus scale going back and raising to the Cravath scale,” but said we required additional corroboration.

We now have the requisite confirmation. On Tuesday, Simpson Thacher — which was the first firm to match the Sullivan & Cromwell spring bonuses, and therefore crucial in helping the S&C bonuses spread to other firms — announced that it would adopt the Cravath spring bonus scale (which is even higher than S&C’s).

Let’s go back to our listing of which firms have announced spring bonuses at which levels. Now that STB has raised to Cravath levels, only Sullivan & Cromwell and Cleary Gottlieb remain on the lower scale.

What will happen next?

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Simpson Raises to Cravath Spring Bonus Scale”

20 Comments

January Lawyer of the Month Restores Faith in Humanity

By

Thank you, Above the Law readers. The results are in for January’s Lawyer of the Month, and I can happily report that I do not write for an audience comprised solely of heartless, cynical d-bags.

Seriously, I’m going to be able to talk to my mother about what I do for a living for a whole week.

In a month that had some worthwhile competitors, one lawyer stood out above the rest…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “January Lawyer of the Month Restores Faith in Humanity”

18 Comments

Lawyer of the Month: January Reader Poll

By

As many of you know, one of our running features here at Above the Law is Lawyer of the Day. We don’t literally name one every day, but we like to keep you informed of the famous and infamous lawyers of the world. At the end of the year, we give you guys an opportunity to vote for a Lawyer of the Year.

Apparently you guys like to vote on lawyers, so why limit the experience to once a year? Above the Law has decided to let you crown a lawyer every month. We’ll pick the nominees (going forward, feel free to submit nominees to us at tips@abovethelaw.com, and you’ll vote for the most deserving. There are no specific criteria — just vote for the lawyer or lawyers you think most deserve the title.

Let’s get to this month’s nominees…

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Lawyer of the Month: January Reader Poll”

26 Comments

Associate Bonus Watch: Cravath Enters the Bonus Wars — and Beats S&C!

By

The venerable firm of Cravath, Swaine & Moore — still widely regarded as setting the market for associate compensation at large law firms, even if other places pay more — has announced springtime bonuses. These bonuses are on top of the recent year-end bonuses that Cravath paid in December 2010.

And get this: the CSM bonuses are higher than the spring bonuses previously announced by Sullivan & Cromwell. Wow!!!

For the classes of 2010 though 2008, the bonuses are on the S&C scale. But for the class of 2007 on up (more senior), the Cravath bonuses are more generous than SullCrom’s.

It seems that Cravath has gotten the memo: Cachet is nice, but cash is nicer.

So how generous are the Cravath bonuses for the more senior classes?

UPDATE (8:45 PM): After the jump, we have added a table comparing the Cravath total bonus to the Sullivan & Cromwell / Simpson Thacher / Cleary Gottlieb total bonus.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Cravath Enters the Bonus Wars — and Beats S&C!”

95 Comments

Musical Chairs: Legal Celebrities on the Move
(Including the energy lawyers going from MWE to CWT.)

By

Ted Cruz

A new year, a new job. That seems to be the thinking of many within the legal profession, based on the proliferation of professional moves we have to report (and not just out of Howrey).

We’ll start with one move that’s aspirational rather than actual. Legal and political superstar Ted Cruz — the Morgan Lewis partner who heads the firm’s Supreme Court and appellate practice, and who was recently named one of the 25 greatest Texas lawyers of the past 25 years — will run for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by the good senatrix Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX). Check out the announcement on his website, or read this BLT post.

Like many lawyers turned politicians, including our current president, the 40-year-old Cruz is a Harvard Law grad (and one of The Elect — Rehnquist / OT 1996). Graduates of HLS’s rival to the south, Yale Law School, tend to take more quirky paths.

Yul Kwon

That brings us to the second move of the day. YLS grad Yul Kwon — a former Second Circuit clerk and McKinsey consultant, the first Asian-American winner of Survivor, and one of People’s “sexiest men alive” (in 2006) — has left the Federal Communications Commission. Kwon served as deputy chief of the consumer and governmental affairs bureau at the Commission.

Instead of working at the FCC, Kwon, 35, will be regulated by it: he’s going to be the host of a new television series on PBS, America Revealed (which sounds pretty cool). Read more from the FCC (press release), Bloomberg, and the Washington Post.

More moves — a Cravath partner’s jump over to Wall Street, and the defection of many McDermott energy lawyers to Cadwalader — after the jump.

double red triangle arrows Continue reading “Musical Chairs: Legal Celebrities on the Move
(Including the energy lawyers going from MWE to CWT.)“

36 Comments
Page 8 of 181...456789101112...18