I’ll go out on a limb and say I think Linklaters’ decision to announce headline profits per equity partner (PEP) based on full-drawing partners is fair enough. But it looks like I’m in a minority, with just Tony Angel and Links’ finance director Nick Heywood-Waddington for company. Actually, I’d assumed it was widely known that the firm’s PEP was cut that way, but some of the firm’s closest rivals seemed genuinely shocked as the fact was made plain in its recent results (see page 10).
Yet, the fact that the firm had used country weightings since its merger with Oppenhoff & Raedler was hardly a state secret. The model is used on a variable country basis to cope with lower profitability in several foreign markets. Based on the figures issued last week, Linklaters has 145 partners on a reduced equity entitlement – the largest number still drawn from its German practice.
