Plaintiffs Securities Litigation Lawyer Taking Qs Forum

[Anonymous User]

Many law students don't know about this field (it was never on my radar when I was in law school), so thought I'd take some Qs on this.

Some background about me: graduated from a T6 during the height of the recession. Went straight into plaintiff's securities lit on advice from a friend. Currently a mid-level associate (4th to 6th year).

[Anonymous User]

What's the general starting salary at a shop like this and what do the salary increases look like a year?

What if any are the typical exit options/are you at the same firm you started with?

Do you practice securities exclusively or other related practices as well?

How many hours are you billing a year?

How likely are you to make partner and what's the trajectory?

How does client acquisition work in the field?

[Anonymous User]

Which market are you in?

Are there any markets that you cannot really practice this type of work in? i.e. is it New York Centric?

Do you enjoy your work?

What does the future of this practice area look like?

[Anonymous User]

What's the general starting salary at a shop like this and what do the salary increases look like a year?

What if any are the typical exit options/are you at the same firm you started with?

Do you practice securities exclusively or other related practices as well?

How many hours are you billing a year?

How likely are you to make partner and what's the trajectory?

How does client acquisition work in the field?

1. I started in the 70-80K range. Now I'm in the 180K-200K range as a mid-level.

2. I'm at the same firm. Exit options are not great - - most viable exit is to another firm doing the same thing.

3. Exclusively securities class action matters.

4. About 1700-1800 hours a year.

5. Hard to say. There is no "trajectory" like in biglaw. I guess it will depend on the growth of the firm, the coming/departure of attorneys, and how many partners they want to have for the firm.

6. The goal is to get institutional clients (e.g. funds, pensions, etc.) which provides a more stable clientele and ability to get big cases. Otherwise, you have to rely on individual investors who "sign up" after you issue a press release about a particular lawsuit.

[Anonymous User]

What's the general starting salary at a shop like this and what do the salary increases look like a year?

What if any are the typical exit options/are you at the same firm you started with?

Do you practice securities exclusively or other related practices as well?

How many hours are you billing a year?

How likely are you to make partner and what's the trajectory?

How does client acquisition work in the field?

1. One of NYC/LA

2. Geographically this is pretty flexible. There are lots of such firms in NY/LA (just as there are lots of other firms in those cities), but you can also find many plaintiffs securities firms in secondary cities.

3. Yes I do. Work is interesting and challenging...mixture of law, finance, and economics. You're typically up against biglaw firms, so you're generally facing the best competition there is.

4. Field generally looks pretty stable to me. I think the most notable trend in recent years is that rather than 1-2 big plaintiffs firms dominating the field, now there are lots of smaller firms each with a piece of the pie.

[deepseapartners]

Does a typical day for you look substantively different than a typical day for a midlevel associate at a Biglaw firm?

[sublime]

How is your firm regarded among plaintiffs lawyers? Assuming well, how do you feel about shitty plaintiffs lawyers?

How do you feel about defense lawyers?

[nonever]

How is your firm regarded among plaintiffs lawyers? Assuming well, how do you feel about shitty plaintiffs lawyers?

How do you feel about defense lawyers?

Going off this: Who do you consider the strongest plaintiffs' firms? Who do you consider the strongest defense firms?

Do you foresee any impact on the field under the Trump administration, or do you view it as relatively stable?

What advice would you give a junior plaintiffs' securities litigator?

[Anonymous User]

Does a typical day for you look substantively different than a typical day for a midlevel associate at a Biglaw firm?

I've never worked in biglaw so I can't speak to what a "typical" day is for biglaw associates.

Not sure whether I have a typical day either. I run/manage my own cases, so depending on what is going on in those cases, my days can be quite different. Some days I might be doing legal research and writing a brief, other days I might be in court, or prepping for a deposition, etc.

[Anonymous User]

How is your firm regarded among plaintiffs lawyers? Assuming well, how do you feel about shitty plaintiffs lawyers?

How do you feel about defense lawyers?

I wouldn't say we're one of the "top" plaintiffs firms, but we are very active and well-known in our field.

Bad/unethical plaintiffs lawyers give us a bad name. When they do sloppy work and file sloppy briefs, it impacts how judges view the plaintiff's bar.

My experience with defense lawyers has ran the gamut. Some are good people doing good work, some are downright deceitful and I wouldn't trust with a piggy bank.

[Anonymous User]

How is your firm regarded among plaintiffs lawyers? Assuming well, how do you feel about shitty plaintiffs lawyers?

How do you feel about defense lawyers?

Going off this: Who do you consider the strongest plaintiffs' firms? Who do you consider the strongest defense firms?

Do you foresee any impact on the field under the Trump administration, or do you view it as relatively stable?

What advice would you give a junior plaintiffs' securities litigator?

The strongest plaintiffs firms, in my opinion, are probably Bernstein Litowitz, Robbins Geller, and Labaton Sucharow. On the defense side, I've been impressed by O'Melveny Myers, Simpson Thacher, Skadden and Weil Gotshal.

I don't really see any major changes in this field under Trump. A few years ago the Supreme Court decided the Halliburton case (concerning whether plaintiffs can rely on fraud-on-the-market to establish reliance), I don't see any other game-changers on the horizons.

My advice to junior plaintiffs attorneys is to try to work on each stage of a securities class action. These cases are long and complicated, Don't allow yourself to be pigeonholed into one specific aspect of these cases. I.e. don't just be a case initiation attorney, or discovery attorney, or only be in charge of settlements. Try to get experience in every aspect of a case from inception to conclusion - that's the only way to truly understand these cases.

[Anonymous User]

Are your bonuses tied to case wins?

How big is your office and how has that impacted your workload?

Do you do any work in client acquisition re: the bigger funds? If so what does that entail?

Does your office typically promote from within?

Do you do any case evaluation? What's that process like?

Have you ever thought of jumping to the defense side? Have you been approached by any head hunters?

[Anonymous User]

Double post

[Anonymous User]

Thank you for taking the time to answer questions. There is so little information out there on plaintiffs side opportunities, and every little bit really helps. Here are a few questions:

1. Did the salary info you gave above include bonus? How variable is your bonus?

2. If you know, how does your salary compare to the "top" securities firms you identified? How about hours?

3. Do you have a sense of what partners at your firm make? Is it highly variable within the firm? Do partners work similar hours to you?

4. If you got a call from one of the top defense firms you listed and they offered you a job, would you take it? What do you think the major pros/cons would be?

5. If you were interested in going out on your own, do you think that would be a realistic option someday?

6. Do you know anything about other plaintiff side subspecialties? I'm particularly interested in what life is like at a mass tort or higher end PI shop.

7. What, other than timekeeping, is worst part of your job?

Sorry if these are a little strange. Thanks!

[Anonymous User]

Do you know what the salary/bonus range is for one of the strong plaintiff's side firms you mentioned above (Bernstein/Robbins)?

[Anonymous User]

Wanted to resurrect this thread because this practice area is super interesting...

Does anyone else have experience in plaintiff's securities work? Would love to know more.

[Anonymous User]

Bump

[Anonymous User]

BUMP. Definitely interested in hearing your response to some of the questions asked. I actually work in Plaintiffs Securities Lit and am getting paid very little as a first year!!! Would love to hear from you about how easy or difficult it is to switch firms, average salary, etc.

[Anonymous User]

Bumping this because I would've liked to see this continued when I was looking to lateral. Junior/mid-level at a what is considered one of the top handful of securities plaintiff shops. Only been there matter of months but feel like the differences are truly night and day. Ama if you care. Away for a deposition with some down time.

[soft blue]

Bumping this because I would've liked to see this continued when I was looking to lateral. Junior/mid-level at a what is considered one of the top handful of securities plaintiff shops. Only been there matter of months but feel like the differences are truly night and day. Ama if you care. Away for a deposition with some down time.

DE shop?

How many cases are quick nuisance settlements vs hard fact / law issues?

How smart are major boards about protecting themselves (e.g. Revlon duties)?

How do you feel about courts selecting class counsel? Do they make you act less aggressively than you would otherwise? Not a factor?

[Anonymous User]

1. So to be clear, I do primarily 10b5 cases and not shareholder derivative work in Del. Most decent firms in this space do both, but I only do the former. Long way of saying I'm not in Delaware. And frankly, derivative litigation seems like a more niche and generally smaller scale practice (in terms of potential liability).

2. It varies wildly. There are a good number of nuisance suits. But you also have to think about the degree of challenge for plaitniffs securities firms under the PSLRA. Because of the mandatory discovery stay until the MTD is decided and the heightened pleading standards, it's genuinely hard to prosecute these cases even when the facts are pretty favorable. It takes a lot of investigation and creativity. The end effect being that good cases can still be hard to bring and scant on discernable facts.

3. Again I don't do shareholder litigation really so I can't be of much use on this. Others at my firm would have a lot to say but I don't know enough, frankly.

4. So, under the PSLRA, class counsel is selected basically by which plaintiff has the largest predicted losses under the proposed class period in the complaint. So generally there isn't a ton of variance unless there is something unusual regarding plaintiff or counsel. More generally, the consequence of the PSLRAs class counsel selection method means that the big rat race for big securities plaintiffs firms is to attain the largest institutional clients, usually pension funds or some of the larger asset managers.

[Anonymous User]

Thanks for doing this.

I'm making a similar move in the very near future, so the die is already kind of cast but just wondering.

1) What made you decide to make the switch?

2) Even though you only made the move recently, are you happy with you decision? What are the main differences (assuming you came over from biglaw, sorry if this isn't correct)? What are the hours like?

3) What are your long term plans now that you're doing plaintiff side securities work?

[Anonymous User]

Bump for answers to the above.

[Anonymous User]

Thanks for doing this.

I'm making a similar move in the very near future, so the die is already kind of cast but just wondering.

1) What made you decide to make the switch?

2) Even though you only made the move recently, are you happy with you decision? What are the main differences (assuming you came over from biglaw, sorry if this isn't correct)? What are the hours like?

3) What are your long term plans now that you're doing plaintiff side securities work?

Sorry for the late response! Short answer is I HATED biglaw. It was boring, it was tedious, I didn't feel valued, and you're in a morally suspect position a good chunk of the time. To the point of flaring up some real mental health issues. I've always been been interested in plaintiffs shops. I was also pretty into the finance-y aspects of my biglaw gig so I thought it was a good fit. I have some moral qualms with what we do and plaintiff-side practice more generally but at the end of the day I get to fuck up corporations. I like that.

2. I've never regretted the move. I've been really busy and stressed and still, even in the moment, haven't regretted making the change. Differences are truly night and day. Where in biglaw as a juniorish attorney I was doing doc review, one off research assignments (sometimes), and doing discovery/investigation adjacent bs like outlines, binders, interview/depo stenography etc., here I draft dispositive motions (including in federal appellate courts), complaints, directly interact with experts and opposing counsel, way in on strategy etc. It's truly night and day. The only things I don't do, and let me remind you I'm fairly junior, are take depositions or be the point person on important matters (like court conferences). I imagine I could probably take a minor deposition within the year. My hours are long. I'd say the equivalent to a 2200-2500 hour billable year in biglaw. But billing isn't a thing, really (not in the sense that people gauge your quality as an asset to the firm) and the time is spent thinking and writing and speaking. I think even at the top level plaintiff side work is more interesting and requires greater creativity then defense side work. Downside is it can be uniquely stressful. Compensation is also a mystery to me as I've just started. My impression is by bonus season we're close to market and sometimes above or below, but I truly don't know.

3. There are a lot of things I find myself thinking about doing after this. I like the work enough that I could see myself doing it for a while. Maybe not as a lifelong career but maybe until close to junior partner status. I also am biding my time until 2020 where hopefully a progressive Dem wins. If so, I think my resume looks relatively good to the SEC or maybe other financial regulatory agencies. Have also thought about trying to get into the policy side of securities and other financial regulation, maybe by going back to school or seguing into something policy facing. Also monitoring clerkships. Also interested in maybe moving over to other p-side shops that do mass tort class actions, discrimination, employment etc.

[soft blue]

... but at the end of the day I get to fuck up corporations. I like that.

What are your thoughts re: the two common arguments against shareholder class lit, which I understand as follows:

1.) Really you're just hurting current shareholders (by reducing the value of the company), and it's unclear who wins there -- but the current shareholders are certainly innocent of wrongdoing.

2.) Shareholder class actions don't touch the people who actually made money off of this stuff (i.e. executives etc).