A new study of corporate legal departments confirms what most general counsels already know: 2009 is going to be a rough year.
Forty percent of legal departments expect a decrease in their overall operating budget for 2009, compared to only 8 percent last year. At the same time, however, litigation activity is rising—particularly for the financial sector, besieged by investors unhappy with the sub-prime mortgage meltdown and victims of the Bernard Madoff Ponzi scheme.
Wolf
“Even though budgets are being tightened, litigation is going up,” says Rick Wolf, CEO of the consulting firm Lexakos, which conducted the survey. “What it ...