Strong London figures from US trio
The London offices of three prominent US firms have unveiled their autumn 2016 retention results, and they’re all pretty good.
New York-headquartered giant Cleary Gottlieb has confirmed an impressive retention rate of 100%, holding on to all nine trainees due to qualify next month.
It’s perhaps not surprising: the firm — which offers 14 London-based training contracts annually — pays its newly qualified (NQ) lawyers an eye-watering £96,000 a year.
Also boasting a perfect retention rate of 100% is Covington & Burling, a US firm with offices on The Strand, London.
Seven out of seven trainees have committed their future to the multi-specialist firm. Two of these seven will end up in the dispute resolution team and two the corporate team. The remaining NQs will join the firm’s employment, life sciences and tech/media teams.
Down the road near St Pauls, K&L Gates will be welcoming six new lawyers to its ranks. Though the US-headquartered firm won’t be boasting a 100% retention score like Cleary and Covington, six out of seven (86%) isn’t bad, and is 8% higher than its last retention rate of 78%.
K&L Gates’ NQs will be taking home a cool £68,000 a year, £24,000 higher than the firm’s second year trainee salary.