Friday, January 26, 2007 6:27 AM
Bruce McEwen over at Adam Smith, Esq. has a great post entitled, It's Happening Sooner Than You Think, which discusses developments in the United Kingdom on the topic of public investments in law firms.
Thanks to the Clementi Commission reforms, which will take effect next year, public investment in law firms will be legal; indeed, law firms could hypothetically take themselves through an IPO. And it's not just public investors, but partners bearing money of all types: Firms could join forces with investment advisors, management consultants, commercial real estate brokers, wealth management specialists and private bankers, etc., etc.
Mr. McEwen's post also references a recent Legal Week article, Prowling banks move to take legal top 50 to stock market, which suggests that "[s]ome of the world's top banks have begun wooing major UK law firms as investment targets, as the legal profession gears up for sweeping regulatory reforms."
If you are at all interested in this topic, I would suggest you read both the above-referenced article and Mr. McEwen's post, in which he offers his own insight into the whys and hows of public investment in UK law firms.
Good stuff.