Kirkland & Ellis ranked first among legal advisers for North American mergers and acquisitions in the first six months of 2026, leading by both deal value and number of transactions, according to GlobalData.
Data from GlobalData’s Financial Deals Database showed the firm worked on 245 transactions with a combined value of $367.7bn.
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In the value ranking, Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison was second with $294.7bn in advised deals. Sullivan & Cromwell followed with $273.9bn, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom with $186bn, and Latham & Watkins with $173.5bn.
In the volume table, Latham & Watkins was second with 162 deals. Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison recorded 95 deals, followed by Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher with 88 and Ropes & Gray with 72.
GlobalData lead analyst Aurojyoti Bose commented: “Kirkland & Ellis was the top adviser by volume in H1 2025 and managed to retain its leadership position by this metric in H1 2026 as well while its ranking by value improved from the third position to the top position during this period.
“Due to the involvement in some big-ticket deals, the total value of deals advised by Kirkland & Ellis almost doubled in H1 2026 compared to H1 2025, which helped it top the table. During H1 2026, Kirkland & Ellis advised on 46 billion-dollar deals* that also included five mega deals valued more than $10 billion.”
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.
