A&O's PEP talk amounts to little

Allen & Overy (A&O) may not have quite regained its position as the most profitable City firm after Slaughter and May, but it’s certainly had the biggest PR campaign.

Today senior partner Guy Beringer and managing partner David Morley have been unveiling their results to the world. See story.

Unfortunately, Beringer’s hilariously idealistic pronouncement earlier this year that profit per equity partner (PEP) wasn’t important has meant that A&O has found itself in a slight bind.

PEP is way up, but most of the corporate message today appears to be about investing in people and excellence and international offices and clients and motherhood and apple pie… or something.

So we’ll reveal what A&O is just that little bit too shy to say: PEP is back up over a million and the equity partners at the top of A&O’s inordinately long lockstep are on £1.54m.

Not that it matters, of course.