Today we released our fifth annual "SCAS 50" report.

Based on data from the SCAS database, the SCAS 50 lists the top 50 plaintiffs' law firms ranked by the total dollar amount of final securities class action settlements occurring in 2007 in which the law firm served as lead or co-lead counsel.

We look at the data in three main ways for each firm - total settlement dollars, total number of settlements, and average value per settlement. I have listed the top five firms in each category below.

The full report is available here.

2007's Top 5 - Total settlement value:
1. Milberg Weiss
2. Grant & Eisenhofer
3. Schiffrin Barroway Topaz & Kessler
4. Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins
5. Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann

2007's Top 5 - Average settlement value:
1. Grant & Eisenhofer
2. Milberg Weiss
3. Labaton Sucharow
4. Schiffrin Barroway Topaz & Kessler
5. Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann

2007's Top 5 - Number of settlements:
1. Coughlin Stoia Geller Rudman & Robbins
2. Schiffrin Barroway Topaz & Kessler
3. Milberg Weiss
4. Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossmann
5. Weiss & Lurie
5. Cohen Milstein Hausfeld & Toll

A few observations.
1. Comparing the 2007 numbers to last year's rankings, we see that settlement values do indeed seem to be rising. The cutoff for the Top 20 last year - $94.1 million; For this year - $148.5 million. The increase cascades all the way to the end of the list, where last year $8.5 million would get you on the list, but this year, the price of admission is $17.5 million.

2. It is somewhat surprising to see Bernstein Litowitz in the top 5 for the number of settlements (as opposed to dollar value or average) as the firm is known to be very selective in choosing cases, and thus is potentially involved in fewer cases at any given time.

3. This is the first time that both Cohen Milstein and Weiss & Lurie have been ranked in the top 5 for one of our categories. One might ordinarily say that it is nice to see some fresh faces at the top, but both firms (or their predecessor firms) are old stalwarts in the plaintiffs bar. We have yet to see any of the truly new faces in securities litigation (Motley Rice, Kahn Gauthier, etc.) high up on these rankings.

Also, RiskMetrics Group will hold its next What You Need to Know for 2008 webcast, Securities Litigation: What European Investors Need to Know, on Friday, March 14 at 14:30 GMT/15:30 CMT/10:30 a.m. EDT. The forum will examine litigation trends and provide important information for European investors who may want to participate in securities class actions. To register for the webcast, please visit here.