Robert here. Senior cap markets associates at top US firms who are native Chinese have never been as marketable in HK / China as they are today. While such persons have over the past five years always had attractive HK /China options at US and UK firms, as well as in-house, in ’10 we have seen these opportunities expand and improve (more clear shot to partner opportunities than usual) significantly. Further, this may be a relatively small window of time, one to two years perhaps, where these clear shot to partner positions are available in such relative abundance (a handful available at one time, versus zero to one usually at any given time).

To clarify, a clear shot to partner opportunity is one where a business case already exists at a new hire’s new firm for that person to make equity partner. In other words, there is already an equity partner slot open and pegged for such new hire. Of course the senior associate / counsel / salary partner will have to perform, but there is already plenty of deals for that person to execute and the only variable (baring a catastrophe in the market) to making equity partner is that person’s performance, rather than the many variables outside of one’s control that almost always come into play for equity partner promotion (even in the most realistic and strong partnership tracks, there is most usually not already a business case for a new hire to make partner before he / she joins the firm and the business case can be in part made by the new hire’s performance, but also even more usually relies on supervising partners’ and / or new hire’s ability to expand the current practice).

There are a growing number of US cap markets practices in HK / China that have very strong deal flow (emanating from the IPO boom over the past year in HK / China), but are missing a senior native Chinese associate / counsel / junior partner to both execute deals and maintain existing client relations. In many cases in HK / China, top US cap markets groups do not have Chinese partners and although such groups’ partners are market leaders and deal makers, they could use a rising senior associate / counsel to lean on who happens to be native Chinese. The candidates that fill such roles today are being handed one of the leading keys to their new firm’s China practice, in that they are being given both the deals to execute and a leading role in the existing client relations. The former is of course a pre-requisite to having partnership and top in-house senior roles, but the latter is a rare special opportunity that gives a rising attorney a lot of leverage both in the market at large and at his / her current firm. As top US firms are building HK practices and top UK firms are expanding US practices, having a stellar native Chinese senior US associate / counsel on board is more important today than ever before.

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