does anyone have advice for the best way to prep for a vac scheme, to give you the best chance of getting the training contract? would really appreciate any tips on anything I could be doing now!
TCLA Vacation Scheme Applications Discussion Thread 2024-25
- Thread starter Jessica Booker
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Hi there - I have an in-person interview for Arnold & Porter which includes a written assessment - any insight to the process would be incredible!
"Would you kindly provide an update on timeframes if this it all possible? I understand if this is not the case, but I felt I should be transparent with the firm as I am considering other offers with looming deadlines. Thank you in advance for your understanding". Although IMO if it's imminent, call them.
- Sep 9, 2024
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Thank you again for the kind words Chris😄!! For the question about Paul, Weiss' position in the City, I would describe it as a middle-to-large office with a full service offering tailored for PE clients and a strategic focus on high end mandates. While its English law practice is very new, you can definitely argue this will not be an impediment for delivering the highest quality of legal services on the most complex matters. Firstly, Paul, Weiss has poached some of the most renowned practitioners in most of its practice areas - leaders in their fields such as Neel Sachdev in leveraged finance and Nicole Kar in antitrust. Secondly, Paul, Weiss' expansion was quite unique in that it poached many ready-made teams of partners and associates. Thus, many of its lawyers will know how to seamlessly work together from day one. Even for those that had not worked in the same teams before, integration is likely to have been a lot easier than normally would have been the case. The legal press reported that the majority had a background at either Kirkland or Linklaters, which means that they will have both been trained in the same style and will have likely known each other and had working relations.
For the second question, I would firstly comment that the more relevant competitors of Paul, Weiss' would be US and not UK firms. This is both because of Paul, Weiss' focus on PE, in which the US firms tend to dominate, and simply because the clients the firm is hoping to represent are US-based PE firms who need advice and services on deals/matters with English law elements. Among the US competitors, because on Paul, Weiss' high-end focus, those will mostly be the firms in the V10 and (to a somewhat lower extent) the V20. The Vault rankings are of course not an objective ranking of expertise, but I would argue they are a rough indicator to the "band" of prestige a US firms places into, especially in relation to high-end transactional matters. The lower down the list you go, the greater the likelihood that you won't often find that particular firm advising on the highest value mandates.
Now within the V20, different firms will have different practice area strengths. and will target different client bases. To identify the most important competitors, you want to identify the firms that Paul, Weiss' will most often find themselves pitching against when trying to win a mandate. Thus, the ones you want to pick are those whose core client base consists of PE clients. Since Skadden's central focus is on corporate M& and its core client base consists of multinational corporations, I would not name them among Paul, Weiss' greatest competitors. Normally I would have made a similar comment on Davis Polk, as its focus is on capital markets and the most important clients are investment banks like JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley. However, after its recent expansion in London I would say the firm is now getting closer to an equal split of M&A/PE practitioners and capital markets ones. More importantly, Davis Polk's London office has previously advised Apollo on a number of mandates, and Apollo is the one key client that Paul, Weiss has a very strong relationship to in the US; and which it now aims to also represent on as many London matters as possible.
Nonetheless, looking at both US rankings and UK practice area focus and client base, the firms I would consider to be Paul, Weiss' foremost competitors are: Kirkland, Latham, Simpson Thatcher, and Weil.
Ashurst moving D-Day to February 28th is insanely funny to me, like why prolong our misery beyond what is necessary
genuinely curious but what sort of answers do firms want/expect to hear when they ask you questions along the lines of would you still work for a client if you had moral qualms about them etc etc
Spot on analysis of Weil! PE is not doing well but Finance is booming atm. Also Mike Francies left last yr.
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An office with no real autonomy that leans heavily on another larger office. In the context of S&C the vast majority of decisions are made in New York and London is an afterthought. Work tends to originate in NY with the London office mainly used to service the European needs of American clients. That isn't to say that S&C London originates no work and has no seat at the decision-making table but London is a far smaller cog in the firm's worldwide operations compared to some other U.S firms.
if Cravath ever started expanding, their first destination wouldn’t 99% be London. And I don’t think they ever will because their entire V1 ranking rests on them being an exclusively NY firm. Although «satellite» is arguably a derogatory term, it is only derogatory from the perspective of a non-US lawyer. You always have to bear in mind that US firms exist in London in the first place because at some point the US headquarters chose to expand into London.
I think a good one would be the change in M&A activity from the start of last year compared to this year.
I saw a post on LinkedIn by Paul, Weiss which was a memo discussing this topic. I have linked it below:
It has a lot of tables, charts and graphs but I think it is a current commercial topic that might come up in AC’s so would be good to look at. 🙂
www.paulweiss.com
I saw a post on LinkedIn by Paul, Weiss which was a memo discussing this topic. I have linked it below:
It has a lot of tables, charts and graphs but I think it is a current commercial topic that might come up in AC’s so would be good to look at. 🙂
M&A at a Glance (February 2025)
Both U.S. strategic and sponsor deal values and counts rose significantly in January compared with December, while global M&A activity declined. » view the report
www.paulweiss.com
So long as you follow the news you'll be fine.
Pick topics that affect the key practice areas of the firm you're applying to
Easy common topics:
- Interest rates and their effect on M&A/ PE i.e. valuations, sales, servicing debt, borrowing costs.
- Competition and the stance in Europe and UK- push on innovation i.e merger remedies review and new CMA head, but crack down in certain sectors i.e tech and new laws, new national control hybrid clause, and the Nippon Steel case in the USA which could influence the stance in the UK
- Political stability- tariffs, uncertainty around trumps policies and how that affects willingness to complete deals cus of effects on inflation/ value of the pound
- For Equity Capital Markets- the July 2024 new listings regime and potential affects on the LSE
- Private credit growth due to high interest rates but how its likely to stay due to flexibility of borrowing terms
Possible.
Would need a sizeable shift in mentality from the senior partners in NY. Thing is their set up works really well for them rn in the US, especially for the top partners. Until their profitability drops, competition racks up and they lose mandates theres no need to risk the investment in another jurisdiction. Freshfields has made some big hires from cravath in NY, and theyve dropped rankings in some M&A league tables, which might trigger a shift. But they're so high end in their own jurisdiction that they probably don't need to in the near future (Slaughter and May?).
But tbh the bigger problem is who do you hire? Paul, Weiss happened pretty much out of the blue, because an internal power struggle at K&E meant top partners with big clients wanted to move (Johnson, Sachdev). Sure, they were offered a lot of money, but they also had an incentive to leave and build up something new. Cravath does mainly public M&A; big corporate clients tend to be tied to a firm (or panel of firms) for the range of legal advice they need, and top dealmakers are usually culturally and financially committed to their firms (Roland Turnill, Claire Wills, Jonny Myers are all execs). That's why Bruce Embley's move to CC was so big. I don't see Cravath making such a breakthrough any time soon in London. But you never know...
I'm not sure. I am still waiting on a response post VI.
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