Partner pay at City firm Ashurst has plunged below the £1m mark, after the firm today reported a 35% fall in profits.

Profits per equity partner fell from £1.04m in 2007/08 to £673,000 in the year to 30 April 2009. Revenues fell 7%, from £323m to £301m over the same period.

Ashurst managing partner Simon Bromwich said it is likely to be 2010 before there is any material pick-up in work, but that he is ‘confident of the future'.

‘We have had some benefit from foreign exchange movements but our cost base was too high for our levels of activity and our profitability has suffered accordingly,’ he said.

Bromwich said the firm’s projects and energy practices have grown and its teams in Italy and Spain have been busy. ‘We are also starting to see more opportunities in Asia and our structured financial products team in the US have made an encouraging start,’ he said.