Magic Circle Law Firms

You’ve probably heard of the phrase 'the magic circle'. Not to be confused with the magicians' union of the same name, this is a moniker for an elite group of five London law firms which share a focus on corporate and finance work. The Economist labelled the magic circle a group of 'posh London law firms', but we reckon you need a more helpful definition than that.

The name, make-up and size of London's most elite group of firms has gone through several iterations since the 1990s (at one point it was called the 'club of nine' and included Stephenson Harwood, Lovells, Herbert Smith and Norton Rose). The term 'magic circle' was first coined by legal journalists in the late 1990s, and for the past 15 years it has consisted of a distinct group of five: A&O Shearman, Clifford Chance, Freshfields, Linklaters, and Slaughter and May.

What sets these firms apart from the rest of the UK legal market? Well, they are all big, based in London, and have sizeable international operations. All of them have a trainee intake of close to 100 a year, and have a reputation for working graduates hard and demanding a lot of them. The work is heavily focused on corporate and finance: these departments stand at the heart of the firm overseeing multibillion-pound transactions. Teams like employment, tax and IP often play a supportive, advisory role in facilitating these transactions; and a big bulk of litigation work is financial in nature too.