Alexis Lamb here, writing from my soon-to-be-old flat (err, apartment) in Hong Kong. Housing markets tend to be a barometer of more general market conditions, and nowhere is that more apparent than in more emerging economies. While China is more of an emerging superpower than an emerging economy, the grand fall and rise of the Hong Kong property markets are evidence of general economic strength and renewed optimism in this part of the world.

I moved into my current flat in April 2009, smack-dab in the depths of the economic dead zone. I was able to secure my 680 square-foot, high-floor, doorman building with pool and clubhouse for approximately US$1980 (HK$15,000) without the landlord putting up much of a fuss. If anything, the landlord seemed relieved that someone – anyone – was renting his flat!

Fast forward 2 years to mid-March 2011. Landlord decides to nearly double my rent to HK$25,000, or US$3,200! Before I launched into “Why you gotta break my balls”, I did some market research and found that other flats in my building on similar floors were being rented out for a similar price. Time to get a better deal.

Evan here, writing from a lounge on a short layover at LAX. Robert and I just returned to the US this morning from another exhausting China trip (8+ meetings per day makes for early rises and late evenings), something we repeat about every other month. No surprise, but all indications on the ground, from meetings with various corporate / cap markets partners at top law firms in HK / China, we are still planted solidly in an economic and deal flow boom there.

We have been averaging about 2 US associate or counsel placements per week in Asia so far this year, a blistering pace that can’t continue quite frankly, but is an indicator of how hot the market is right now (see recent Asia Chronicles ATL posts for more details on this hiring boom or do a search at theasiachronicles.com for such info).

Just the fact that Robert and I can set up meetings on short notice with the leading corporate partners of top US and UK firms in HK / China (especially in a boom market where time is at a premium for such persons running multiple big deals on understaffed teams) is a major difference between Kinney and other recruiting firms trying to break into the increasingly hot US associate biglaw lateral hiring market in HK / China. Remember that just about every US and UK firm in HK / China are hiring US corporate associates at this time, so you should not settle for a recruiter / agent who simply is aware of openings and can provide a list of firms and can name a few partners there.

Here are just a few glaring differences between Kinney and other recruiting firms offering services in HK / China markets:

-Our top recruiters don’t only represent partners.

-We provide a long-term agent relationship, lasting years instead of weeks or months.

-Kinney Asia recruiters all split time in both Asia and US markets, thus are able to meet with US based associate candidate clients, meet with top US firm management regarding their Asia strategy, and of course meet with law firm partners and associate candidates in Asia.

We can provide over 100 references of US associates we have placed in HK / China in the past few years. Other recruiting firms can provide no more than a fraction of this number. No other recruiting firm has placed even one third of this number of US associates in HK / China in the past few years.

Evan here. As we have been predicted would happen in past posts, a sizzling biglaw US associate lateral hiring boom has arrived in Hong Kong / China for the first quarter ’11. We expect this hiring boom to continue until spring, with hiring being steady afterwards but dropping to more normal levels.

A “perfect storm” has developed, causing many US and UK firms in Hong Kong / China to have multiple US corporate / cap markets urgent openings at one time now.

A lot of these top firms in Hong Kong / China have been understaffed since late 2009. When the global recession went into full swing in late 2008, the downturn had started to seriously affect biglaw deal flow in China (about a year after negative effects were felt in US and other Western markets), with IPOs coming to a stop. There was misguided concern at the time that because China had some dependence on US exports for its economy to be fully fueled, China would be heading into a bubble-busting down turn, even much worse than what was taking place in the US. However, in mid-’09, deal flow in China was booming again, fueled in large part by China’s own consumer economy expanding rapidly. This was no surprise to many of us who have observed China for several years. After all, 2009 was the year that China over took the US in new cars purchased annually, China overtook India in gold purchased annually, and the Asia Pacific Region overtook North America in daily commercial flights.

But much of the world was skeptical the boom could continue more than a short time (dramatic bubble-busting predictions sold newspapers and perhaps made some Westerners feel better about themselves) and thus senior firm management at many firms were reluctant to invest heavily with new hires in China, especially considering the recession in West. With the worst recession of our lifetime in full swing, most US firms were on a global hiring freeze and trying to avoid more layoffs, rather than trying to hire laterals for China. The feeling was also that if there was a need to staff up on some deals in China, it could be done by sending over associates not busy in US, at least temporarily, which was a band-aid on what was becoming an understaffing problem. Further, it was just bad internal politics back them for a partner at a US firm in Asia or elsewhere to try to pressure their management for lateral hires because of the big push in ’09 to keep down costs and try to salvage profit numbers (to help recruit and retain partners) in the midst of a major recession.

Evan Jowers here, with a quick post before the New Year holiday. As you know from our recent posts, Robert Kinney and I have continued our pattern this year of traveling to Hong Kong / China to meet personally with clients and learn of openings (six trips each this year – ouch). Alexis Lamb of course is permanently based in our Hong Kong office and Yuliya Vinokurova travels to Asia periodically from her base in Russia. As a result of our availability to firms and more importantly our success in placing more US attorneys in Asia than any other recruiting firm, we are on top of many US associate openings at present in Hong Kong/China.

As you know from recent posts, we have many current openings for Mandarin fluent cap markets and M&A US associates (too numerous to list here). As the year winds to a close, we wanted to list in one place a description of some of our more unusual openings for US associates at top US and UK firms in Hong Kong / China: