International law firm Brown Rudnick announced today the launch of the Litigation Funding Working Group (LFWG), which brings together leading litigation funders, insurers, institutional claimants, legal advisors and other participants across the litigation funding market in the UK and Europe to develop model documentation to help support the continued growth and development of the litigation funding market.
Led by Elena S. Rey, a partner at Brown Rudnick’s Special Situations team, this initiative comes at a time of rising demand for litigation funding products in an evolving regulatory environment. The model documentation will be freely available and will provide the following benefits across the litigation funding market:
- Promote efficient markets: Improve speed of execution and streamline the negotiation process.
- Develop secondary market: Provide a platform for the development of secondary market transactions by way of novation, participation, assignment or other risk transfer arrangement.
- Market integrity: Improve protections for market participants and provide a bench mark for the judiciary by incorporating best market practice, regulatory standards (including data protection) and judicial practice and adopting a balanced approach between stakeholders.
- Simplicity and Flexibility: Follow the model of other major financial markets by standardising structure and key clauses in a model document while leaving market participants free to incorporate their own commercial and other terms.
- Reduce Risk: Promote the adoption of high standards across the industry and reduce exposure to reputational risk and disputes from poorly constructed contracts.
The initiative will build on the firm’s experience of working with major litigation funders on preparing their model funding documentation for the US market as well as working with the Loan Market Association (LMA) over the last 10 years in preparing model documentation for the real estate finance market and secondary trading documentation.
The model documentation will be produced after extensive consultation with the members of the Working Group and the wider market and will represent an agreed common wording and structure, so that users and providers of litigation funding can rely on standardised boiler plate provisions and focus their negotiations on the commercial elements and other specific considerations. The documentation will be subject to regular review by the LFWG to ensure that it reflects current regulations in relevant jurisdictions and continues to accommodate the requirements of the respective parties.
Elena S. Rey, Partner at Brown Rudnick said: “I would like to thank all of the members for their commitment and enthusiasm towards this important initiative, which will support the development of the litigation funding market and the institutionalisation of the industry by introducing best-in-class documentation. I look forward to collaborating with our members and to making these model documents available to all, which will help ensure that the market continues to operate efficiently and with the highest standards in place.”
The LFWG consists of major funders and institutional claimants – including Affiniti Finance Limited, Arrowhead Capital, Augusta Ventures, BDO Global, Bench Walk Advisors, Deminor Recovery Services, Galion Capital, Grant Thornton UK LLP, King Street, LionFish Litigation Finance, Litigation Capital Management Limited, North Wall Capital, Omni Bridgeway, Therium Capital Management – insurers and brokers – including AmTrust Financial, Litica Ltd., Marsh Ltd., QLCC, and others as well as leading legal & expert advisers and barrister chambers.
About Brown Rudnick LLP
Brown Rudnick combines ingenuity with experience to achieve great outcomes for our clients. It delivers partner-driven services and excellence across its practice areas, which include special situations, finance & litigation funding, distressed debt, corporate restructuring, M&A, tech & life science investments, white collar defence, IP & international disputes. It has offices in key financial centers in the US and Europe and serves its clients in the Middle East, North Africa, Eastern Europe, the Caribbean and Latin America.
Elena S. Rey
Elena represents funders, private equity funds, major corporations and family offices on complex litigation funding as well as leverage finance matters. As a member of the Special Situations team, Elena provides a range of services from helping clients to raise finance for litigation, corporate or tech projects to introducing investors and connecting sources of capital to off-market investment opportunities.
Elena holds a law degree from Harvard University, and is fluent in Russian and French. She is admitted to practice in England & Wales, and is also a member of the New York bar.
