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Move Over Carnival: Litigation Funding in Brazil is Heating Up!

February 13, 2018

Move Over Carnival: Litigation Funding in Brazil is Heating Up!

Writing for Vannin’s Funding in Focus series, Carolina Ramirez, Managing Director in Vannin’s newly-formed New York office, describes the litigation funding climate in South America’s largest and most populous nation. Ramirez highlights both the perceptions and practical applications of litigation finance in Brazil, as well as the regulatory climate and challenges facing industry growth in the region.
Although third party funding arrived on the Brazilian scene only recently, the practice has been warmly embraced relative to other Latin American markets. That has to do with Brazil’s liquidity crisis following the Great Recession, in addition to fallout in the aftermath of Operation Car Wash, or Operação Lava Jato, and the subsequent reliance on arbitration as a result. According to Ramirez, Brazilians maintain a perception that litigation funding is utilized solely by impecunious claimants, or those facing liquidity constraints. Although perceptions are gradually changing, she points to one local practitioner who claims that “case law on the matter is scarce and major Brazilian arbitration chambers do not publish their precedents, so parties (be it funders, funded parties or adversaries to a funded party) still have to deal with a reasonable (and potentially damaging) degree of uncertainty.” Yet despite the uncertainty, the benefits of litigation funding are widely being recognized, with one practitioner going so far as to state that the practice “will evolve to [allow] major companies seeking reasonable financing that allows them to pursue their core business objectives while conducting high level litigation.” Such is the reality of litigation funding in other major jurisdictions, so why not Brazil? Major obstacles to the adoption of litigation funding have to do with costs and time constraints — the former containing too few, and the latter containing far too many. The cost of filing a claim (appeal included) in Brazil is extraordinarily low, which of course precludes firms from seeking external funding. Additionally, cases can go through many layers of appeal before reaching conclusion, which means that funders can’t accurately predict the timing of their expected recovery. Essentially, the barriers to justice that exist in Brazil work against litigation funders, whereas the barriers that exist in the United States, for example (those being high upfront costs and balance sheet exposure), directly play into a litigation funder’s hands. According to Ramirez, by and large, third party funding is unregulated in Brazil. “Only recently did the Brazil-Canada Chamber of Commerce (“CAM/CCBC”) – one of the most renowned institutions in Brazil – issue a resolution specifically recommending that parties disclose the use of funding at the outset of an arbitration (Administrative Resolution 18/2016).” Practitioners on the ground believe in the likelihood that other arbitral institutions will at some point promulgate further regulations on third party funding in Brazil, though at present, the industry remains unregulated. So is Brazil on the precipice of future growth in the area of litigation funding? Ramirez seems to think so. “The resounding message,” she writes, “is that Brazil is ripe for third party funding and that the time to enter the market is now. It is also clear that practitioners are enthusiastic about the prospect of having foreign third party funders with significant experience enter the market and level the playing field which has thus far been dominated by a single local Brazilian third party funder.” To read Ramirez’s article in its entirety, please visit this link. 

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Commercial Regulatory Issues

Life After PACCAR: What’s Next for Litigation Funding?

By John Freund |

In the wake of the UK Supreme Court’s landmark R (on the application of PACCAR Inc) v Competition Appeal Tribunal decision, which held that many common litigation funding agreements (LFAs) constituted damages-based agreements (DBAs) and were therefore unenforceable without complying with the Damages-Based Agreements Regulations, the litigation funding market has been in flux.

The ruling upended traditional third-party funding models in England & Wales and sparked a wide range of responses from funders, lawyers and policymakers addressing the uncertainty it created for access to justice and commercial claims. This Life After PACCAR piece brings together leading partners from around the industry to reflect on what has changed and where the market is headed.

An article in Law.com highlights how practitioners are navigating this “post-PACCAR” landscape. Contributors emphasise the significant disruption that followed the decision’s classification of LFAs as DBAs — disruption that forced funders and claimants to rethink pricing structures and contractual frameworks. They also explore recent case law that has begun to restore some stability, including appellate decisions affirming alternative fee structures that avoid the DBA label (such as multiple-of-investment returns) and the ongoing uncertainty pending legislative reform.

Discussion also centres on the UK government’s response: following the Civil Justice Council’s 2025 Final Report, momentum has built behind proposals to reverse the PACCAR effect through legislation and to adopt a light-touch regulatory regime for third-party funders.

Commercial

Litigation Funding Founder Reflects on Building a New Platform

By John Freund |

A new interview offers a candid look at how litigation funding startups are being shaped by founders with deep experience inside the legal system. Speaking from the perspective of a former practicing litigator, Lauren Harrison, founder of Signal Peak Partners, describes how time spent in BigLaw provided a practical foundation for launching and operating a litigation finance business.

An article in Above the Law explains that Harrison views litigation funding as a natural extension of legal advocacy, rather than a purely financial exercise. Having worked closely with clients and trial teams, she argues that understanding litigation pressure points, timelines, and decision making dynamics is critical when evaluating cases for investment. This background allows funders to assess risk more realistically and communicate more effectively with law firms and claimholders.

The interview also touches on the operational realities of starting a litigation funding company from the ground up. Harrison discusses early challenges such as building trust in a competitive market, educating lawyers about non-recourse funding structures, and developing underwriting processes that balance speed with diligence. Transparency around pricing and alignment of incentives emerge as recurring themes, with Harrison emphasizing that long-term relationships matter more than short-term returns.

Another key takeaway is the importance of team composition. While legal expertise is essential, Harrison notes that successful platforms also require strong financial, operational, and compliance capabilities. Blending these skill sets, particularly at an early stage, is presented as one of the more difficult but necessary steps in scaling a sustainable funding business.

Commercial Regulatory Issues

Australian High Court Limits Recovery of Litigation Funding Costs

By John Freund |

The High Court of Australia has delivered a significant decision clarifying the limits of recoverable damages in funded litigation, confirming that claimants cannot recover litigation funding commissions or fees as compensable loss, even where those costs materially reduce the net recovery.

Ashurst reports that the High Court rejected arguments that litigation funding costs should be treated as damages flowing from a defendant’s wrongdoing. The ruling arose from a shareholder class action in which claimants sought to recover the funding commission deducted from their settlement proceeds, contending that the costs were a foreseeable consequence of the underlying misconduct. The court disagreed, holding that litigation funding expenses are properly characterised as the price paid to pursue litigation, rather than loss caused by the defendant.

In reaching its decision, the High Court emphasised the distinction between harm suffered as a result of wrongful conduct and the commercial arrangements a claimant enters into to enforce their rights. While acknowledging that litigation funding is now a common and often necessary feature of large-scale litigation, the court concluded that this reality does not convert funding costs into recoverable damages. Allowing such recovery, the court reasoned, would represent an expansion of damages principles beyond established limits.

The decision provides welcome clarity for defendants facing funded claims, while reinforcing long-standing principles of Australian damages law. At the same time, it confirms that litigation funding costs remain a matter to be borne out of recoveries, subject to court approval regimes and regulatory oversight rather than being shifted onto defendants through damages awards.