Davis Polk & Wardwell and Kirkland & Ellis top M&A legal advisers table in H1 2025

Davis Polk & Wardwell and Kirkland & Ellis have emerged as the top mergers and acquisitions (M&A) legal advisers in the consumer sector for the first half (H1) of 2025, in terms of value and volume, respectively, according to the latest legal advisers league table by GlobalData.

Davis Polk & Wardwell ranked first by deal value, overseeing transactions totalling $7.2bn while Kirkland & Ellis led by deal volume, advising on ten transactions.

GlobalData lead analyst Aurojyoti Bose said: “Interestingly, Davis Polk & Wardwell did not even feature among the top ten by value in H1 2024 but managed to lead by this metric in H1 2025.

“Both the deals advised by Davis Polk & Wardwell during H1 2025 were billion-dollar deals and involvement in these big-ticket deals helped it occupy the top position by value.

“Meanwhile, Kirkland & Ellis was the top adviser by volume in H1 2024 and managed to retain its leadership position by this metric in H1 2025 as well.”

In the value-based rankings, Paul Hastings secured second place with $5.3bn in advised deals, followed by Cravath Swaine & Moore at $4.9bn, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer at $4.2bn, and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom at $3.5bn.

For deal volume, Latham & Watkins occupied the second position with nine deals, followed by A&O Shearman with seven deals, and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom and Jones Day with six deals each.

GlobalData’s league tables are based on the real-time tracking of thousands of company websites, advisory business 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 of the data, the company also seeks submissions of deals from leading advisers.

“Davis Polk & Wardwell and Kirkland & Ellis top M&A legal advisers table in H1 2025” was originally created and published by Packaging Gateway, a GlobalData owned brand.

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