An Australian case involving contamination from firefighting foam has settled with what the judge called a “fair and reasonable” amount. The class action over PFAS contamination in three Australian towns has been underway for years, involved multiple law firms and over 500 claimants.
Scotland, like much of the world, is bracing for a spike in litigation related to the Coronavirus. Business closures, insurance disputes, non-payment of rent, and other common types of litigation are expected to rise at least three-fold. Once courts are up and running again, the backlog of cases and filings is expected to take 1-3 years to completely clear.
Litigation is more popular than it’s ever been. With a predicted spike in litigation just around the corner, plenty of investors are wondering whether or not they should get involved. This rapidly growing industry has gone from just six dedicated lit fin firms in 2008, to over 40 commercial litigation funding entities as of last year. Together, they manage assets of nearly $10 billion.
Last year, former law firm managing partner John Garda was recruited by Longford Capital to head up their new Dallas office. This includes underwriting in addition to investment sourcing and monitoring. With more than 25 years of litigation experience, his expertise includes complex commercial and securities litigation, investment banking disputes, real estate, and construction disputes, healthcare contracts, and more.
Bankruptcy cases are expected to increase in the coming months, as companies struggle to recover from pandemic-related losses. It’s been reported that firms across the world are looking desperately to hire more bankruptcy lawyers to help handle the expected flood in new cases.
NEW YORK (June 24, 2020) – Leading litigation funder Validity Finance has selected University of Chicago Law School law student Amber S. Stewart for its 2020 Equal Access Fellowship. The program, launched last year, provides a 10-week paid summer fellowship to first-year law students of diverse backgrounds to spend the first half of their summer at Validity learning the basic principles of litigation funding before spending the second half working at the non-profit of their choice. Validity is one of the only funders to provide such a program for first-year law students.
The following article is part of an ongoing column titled ‘Investor Insights.’
Brought to you by Ed Truant, founder and content manager of Slingshot Capital, ‘Investor Insights’ will provide thoughtful and engaging perspectives on all aspects of investing in litigation finance.
Despite improved awareness, the issue of gender inequity in law has not been satisfactorily addressed. It’s difficult to say precisely where the problem lies. What we do know is that General Counsel can be doing more to close the gender gap.
Champerty is a word we hear often in connection with Litigation Finance. Despite the term being coined in the middle ages, champerty remains a reasonable issue to take precautionary measures against. The original purpose of champerty laws was to keep litigation from becoming a commercialized business.
