Kirkland & Ellis secures top spot for North American M&A legal advisory in Q1-Q3 2026
Across the North American region, Kirkland & Ellis handled the highest total deal activity in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) legal advisory throughout the first nine months (Q1-Q3) of 2026, heading rankings measured by both value and volume in the latest legal advisers league table from GlobalData.
GlobalData’s Deals Database recorded 369 transactions for the law firm, together worth $456.6bn.
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Behind Kirkland & Ellis in the value standings, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison secured second place with $360.1bn.
Sullivan & Cromwell took third place with $321.6bn, followed by Latham & Watkins at $243bn and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom at $200.7bn.
In the volume rankings, Latham & Watkins finished second, having worked on 252 deals.
Third went to Fasken Martineau DuMoulin with 133 deals, followed by Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher with 132 deals and Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison with 124 deals.
Top of Form
Bottom of Form
GlobalData lead analyst Aurojyoti Bose said: “Kirkland & Ellis was the clear winner during Q1-Q3 2026, outpacing its peers by a significant margin in terms of both deal volume and value. It retained the top position by volume that it held during Q1-Q3 2025, while its ranking by value improved from second place to first.
“During Q1-Q3 2026, Kirkland & Ellis advised on 67 billion-dollar deals* that also included seven mega deals valued more than $10 billion. Involvement in these big-ticket deals helped it top the chart by value.”
GlobalData’s league tables are based on the real-time tracking of thousands of company websites, advisory firm 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 to the data, the company also seeks submissions of deals from leading advisers.
