Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft is laying off 96 lawyers including some in London in a second round of job cuts as the Wall Street firm reacts to prolonged turmoil in global credit markets.

The cuts, which come after the firm axed 35 associates in January, will affect the capital markets and global finance groups, according to The American Lawyer.

W. Christopher White, the firm's chairman, told the magazine: "If it had been, as we anticipated in the early part of the year, a less severe contraction and not as prolonged a contraction, we would have ridden this out.

"But it seems clear from the advice clients are giving us that this will be more severe and longer than we anticipated."

Mr White said that 90 per cent of the cuts are due to “the downturn in the real estate finance and securitization market".

The bulk of the job losses will fall in the firm’s New York, Charlotte and London offices. A number of administrative staff are also being cut but the firm gave no further details, The American Lawyer said.

Cadwalader is one of several US firms that have laid off associates in response to slower markets. Other US firms to have laid off lawyers include Sonnenschein Nath & Rosenthal, Thacher Proffitt & Wood and McKee Nelson.

Clifford Chance, the world’s largest law firm by revenues, axed six lawyers from a New York-based specialist fixed income team last November, calling the move a “direct response” to deteriorating market conditions.

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