Linklaters has become the first magic circle firm to announce its 2016-17 results, posting a 7.8% hike in profits per equity partner (PEP) alongside a revenue rise of almost 10%.

The magic circle firm's PEP has risen to 1.568m, up from 1.455m last year, an increase that came as the firm grew its equity partnership by 1% from an average of 435.7 last year to 440.6 this year.

Total revenues for the 12-month period rose 9.8%, up from 1.31bn to 1.44bn. The firm said that the results represented a 1.7% increase at constant currency.

Last year Linklaters reported a 3.5% increase in turnover and a 2.5% increase in PEP.

Pre-tax profit this year was 664.4m, equating to an 8.6% increase on last year's figure of 611.9m, but flat at constant currency.

Managing partner Gideon Moore said: I am quite pleased with the overall performance. There were a number of well publicised geopolitical events, like Brexit and Trump, and other things around the globe that had an impact on business, so to come out up on a constant currency basis is a good result. If someone had offered me that at the start of the year, I would have taken it.

Major deals for the firm in the last year include advising on Anheuser-Busch InBev's acquisition of rival brewer SAB Miller and acting for Unilever on its defence of Kraft's multibillion-dollar takeover bid.

We have a fantastic global M&A franchise so making sure the market recognises us a top-tier M&A firm remains a key priority, said Moore.

Moore picked out the US and Southeast Asia as regions that did particularly well.

Our team out in the States had a very good year that was very pleasing. Southeast Asia also rallied and had a good year, he said.

In terms of the upcoming financial year, Moore said that implementation of the firm's new strategy would be a key priority.

Moore and senior partner Charlie Jacobs launched the new strategy at the firm's partner conference in Monaco in April. Key changes include the way partner performance is looked at, including a move away from billing targets and annual partner reviews.

Moore said: Everyone warned me that putting together a strategy refresh was the easy bit, but the implementation and execution is the tricky area. A large part of what we are doing is rallying around the refresh and implementation so we can give the clients the service they want.

Moore and Jacobs are keen to inculcate into partners a sense of responsibility to themselves and to others, and move away from a culture measured by hitting individual targets. Moore says that he wants team leaders to communicate rather than looking at a spreadsheet, when monitoring performance.