When we wrote about seven Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft partners walking out, we reported that America’s most elderly law firm saw profits fall 30%.
But Legal Week reports that earnings at Cadwalader fell by 40%, based on the value of shares held by partners at the firm. In 2008, equity shares were worth around $240,000, compared to just over $400,000 in 2007. The highest value a share at Cadwalader has ever reached was $452,000 in 2006.
What that means for Cadwalader partners depends, of course, on how many shares they hold. As The American Lawyer reported in September, the best-compensated partners get 10 shares, while those on the lowest end of the scale get three. So based on shares alone, a junior partner on the low end took home only $720,000 in 2008, compared to $1.2 million in 2007, and $1.36 in 2006.
A partner on the high-end of the scale could have pocketed $2.4 million in 2008, a sum that pales in comparison to the $4.52 million he or she could have nabbed just two years earlier.
Cadwalader says its revenue in 2008 fell 13.8% to $506 million.