Knowledge

Private Clients: the New Eldorado?

 For a long time, the best way for lawyers to make a lot of money has been to serve corporations: forget the widow and the orphan, if you want to go for the big bucks, you'd better focus on the big corporate clients. The business lawyer rose to prominence amongst his colleagues in terms of economic welfare. He will certainly remain firmly anchored at the top of the profit pyramid, as the practice of business law remains a very lucrative occupation, but he may soon be joined by a new breed of lawyers: private practice lawyers. The number of high net worth individuals is indeed growing. Legal services to the extremely rich are therefore doomed to become a buoyant and lucrative niche in the legal market. It does not mean business lawyers are going to be poorer, it just means that private clients practice might soon become as profitable as corporate practice. The question is who will have and eat the cake? Will business law firms open private practice departments? Will new firms get started with a strategy entirely directed towards the very rich? Will existing law practices for "normal" private clients re-engineer themselves to attract and serve wealthy individuals? Or will private bankers capture all of this market, leaving peanuts to lawyers and law firms? This is a real possibility: private bankers have the network and a reputation among the super rich. They can offer a global package of asset management and legal advice (tax planning, estate planning, succession planning) and therefore offer a one-stop shopping opportunity to the wealthy. Lawyers beware!

Antoine Henry de Frahan | 7 March 2007 |