Offshore: firing on all cylinders

Dominic Carman

As the battle for legal talent intensifies, Dominic Carman examines how leading offshore law firms are managing record volumes of M&A, PE and fundraising

In international legal work, the offshore and onshore worlds are often deeply intertwined. Despite the sustained global impact of COVID-19, the world of deals has never been busier. According to Refinitiv data, the total value of pending and completed M&A deals in 2021 has reached $3.6trn. During the first three quarters of 2021, M&A surged by 140 per cent to reach the $2trn mark – and that was just in the US market. In Q3 alone, global M&A deal value hit $1.07trn, eclipsing the previous high of Q4 2020. Meanwhile, the total value of private equity (PE) deals more than doubled to reach a record $840bn, while the volume of PE deals increased by 66 per cent.

Since a fair amount of this frenetic activity has an offshore component, record deal activity onshore has inevitably led to record activity offshore. But leading offshore law firms have also been very busy across multiple practice areas, as evidenced by critiques from their global managing partners.