Targeting high value litigation
US law firms are securing an outsized grip on the highest-value disputes before the English courts, new data suggests.
Research from legal analytics firm Solomonic found that US firms handled cases with a median claim value of £10 million in 2025, against an all-firm average of just £740,000. While US firms account for only around 4% of London litigation by volume, the quality of work they are landing tells a very different story.
The data also suggests US firms are not shy about going the distance, with claims involving them reaching a judicial outcome 21% of the time, more than double the 9% rate for the wider market.
Their footprint in the Commercial Court has grown steadily too, rising from roughly one in six claims between 2014 and 2022 to almost one in five in recent years.
Quinn Emanuel, Cleary Gottlieb, Reed Smith, Jones Day and Morgan Lewis were the most active US firms by claim count between 2020 and 2025, each racking up more than 100 cases.
Quinn Emanuel — a firm once bold enough to take out a full-page ad in the FT claiming its opponents “dread” facing them in court — crops up repeatedly at the very top end, including in the £36 billion BHP dam proceedings and the Mastercard collective action, valued at least £14 billion.
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