Corporate legal budgets are the lifeblood of the global profession – if large multinationals clamp down on expenditure, then business law firms know about it pretty quickly. Indeed, they’ve been feeling the pain for some time in the fallout of the 2008 global financial crisis. But is that pain abating? Our survey of leading in-house lawyers shows that most general counsel are anticipating no change to their budgets. Worrying perhaps, is that more than a quarter of respondents forecast a dip in their budgets – but then nearly a third of GCs are anticipating an increase, so there will be some lucky recipients out there.