Ashurst has announced disappointing results for 2014/15, with revenue falling 10% and profits per equity partner falling 19%. This follows poor figures for the previous year, and means that PEP has fallen by nearly 25% since 2012/13 to £603,000.

Managing Partner Paul Jenkins admitted that the results were "not where I'd like them to be" and blamed the fall on a number of factors, such as investment in technology and the firm's new Glasgow outpost, a global slowdown and a weak pound.

The problem is that other firms have also invested in their infrastructure and are subject to the same market forces as Ashurst. And that hasn't stopped them from announcing far stronger figures. Star of the City so far is Clifford Chance, with revenues up 3% and PEP up 10% to £1.23m - the highest figure the firm has ever recorded and twice what Ashurst managed. It has just pipped Allen & Overy, where PEP was flat at £1.2m and revenues were up 2.3%. Linklaters and Freshfields have yet to announce, but expect even higher figures.

Herbert Smith Freehills also announced its results this week. It saw revenues rise by 7% and PEP by 5% to £840,000 - 40% up on Ashurst's PEP. That's from a firm that used to be mentioned in the same breath as Ashurst, but which is now bossing it.

    A Herbert Smith partner taking an Ashurst partner's lunch money. How it might look.

Ashurst's woes are more likely to stem from its 2013 merger with Australian firm Blake Dawson. With hindsight it was too big (dozens of partners were shed in the aftermath), it was in the wrong jurisdiction (Australia is overlawyered and, despite hopes to the contrary, has not transpired to be the gateway to lucrative work from China) and it had the wrong focus (the bottom has fallen out of mining and resources). Clearly Ashurst's partners are still on a staggering amount of money and none of them are going to be pulling the kids out of school as a result of this fall. But the firm's recently restructured management team will have some work to do this year if it wants to catch up with its competitors.
 
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Comments

Anonymous 12 July 16 14:48

This is very sad. The Oz gamble has gone horribly wrong and all the good partners are leaving.