Kirkland & Ellis emerged as the leading mergers and acquisitions (M&A) legal adviser in North America for 2024, in terms of deal value and volume, according to the latest league table from GlobalData, a data and analytics firm.

The analysis of GlobalData’s Deals Database revealed that Kirkland & Ellis secured the top spot by advising on 472 deals valued at $343.9bn in North America.

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GlobalData lead analyst Aurojyoti Bose said: “Kirkland & Ellis was the top adviser in 2023 in terms of both value and volume and also managed its leadership position in 2024 as well. It outpaced its peers by a significant margin in terms of deal volume and was just a little short of hitting the 500-deal volume mark in the North American region.

“Several of the deals advised by Kirkland & Ellis in 2024 were big-ticket deals, and involvement in these helped it top the chart by value as well. During the year, it advised on 69 billion-dollar deals that also included nine mega deals valued more than $10 billion.”

Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom ranked second in terms of deal value, advising on $317.1bn worth of transactions, followed by Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison at $277bn, Cravath Swaine & Moore at $223.2bn, and Simpson Thacher & Bartlett at $182.8bn.

In terms of deal volume, Latham & Watkins secured second place with 161 deals, followed by Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher with 156 deals, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison with 146 deals, and Ropes & Gray with 115 deals.

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GlobalData’s league tables are based on the real-time tracking of thousands of company websites, advisory firm websites and other reliable sources available on the secondary domain. A dedicated team of analysts monitors all these sources to gather in-depth details for each deal, including adviser names.

To ensure further robustness to the data, the company also seeks submissions of deals from leading advisers.