Content for the Public

At the European Litigation Funding Conference in March of this year, it was notable that one of the first panels of the event focused on the potential growth of litigation targeting cryptocurrency companies that have allegedly defrauded customers. Whilst it is still uncertain how viable these claims can be, given the difficulties around the valuation of the underlying assets, the announcement of a new claim being brought in the UK suggests that the appetite for these lawsuits is still present.

DealBridge.ai, the first Deal Relationship Management (DRM) platform, is proud to announce its strategic partnership with Equine Capital Solutions LLC (ECS) to transform the complexities of Litigation Finance. ECS, a prominent provider of specialty finance solutions, has chosen DealBridge.ai’s DRM solution as the central technology to modernize its business, incorporating the platform into every aspect of their client, deal, and operational needs.

Jonathan Stroud is General Counsel at Unified Patents, LLC, where he manages a growing team of talented, diverse attorneys and oversees a docket of administrative challenges, appeals, licensing, pooling, and district court work in addition to trademark, copyright, administrative, amicus, policy, marketing, and corporate matters.

The European Litigation Funding Association (ELFA) is pleased to announce Aon’s Litigation Risk Group, the litigation risk solutions arm of Aon’s M&A and Transaction Solutions, has joined ELFA as an associate member. 

Burford Capital, the leading global finance and asset management firm focused on law, today releases new independent research that reveals how businesses are finding solutions to extract greater value from legal claims and judgments, based on a survey of 350 GCs, heads of litigation and senior in-house lawyers in the US, Europe, Asia, Australia and the Middle East.

Gian Marco Solas, Ph.D.², is a qualified lawyer and academic, and currently serves as the Lead Expert at the BRICS Competition Law and Policy Centre and in private practice, where he advises on the application of physics models in (antitrust) litigation and market & investment modeling worldwide.

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), a member of the Senate Judiciary committee, and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) today introduced the Protecting Our Courts from Foreign Manipulation Act of 2023 to stop foreign entities and governments from funding litigation in America’s courts. 

The following piece was contributed by Guido Demarco, Director and Head of Legal Assets at Stonward.

In a groundbreaking legal battle that pitted Petersen Energía SAU and Petersen Energía Inversora SAU[1] (the Petersen Companies) against the Republic of Argentina, the recent decision by the District Court of Southern District of New York has far-reaching implications for the litigation funding industry. This landmark ruling reaffirms the critical role litigation funders play in providing access to justice, particularly in complex cases involving powerful sovereign entities.

Burford Capital Limited (“Burford”), the leading global finance and asset management firm focused on law, today announces its unaudited financial results at and for the three and six months ended June 30, 2023.1 Burford’s report on Form 6-K at and for the three and six months ended June 30, 2023, including unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements (the “2Q23 Quarterly Report”), is available on the Burford Capital website at http://investors.burfordcapital.com.

Certum Group, which provides bespoke solutions for companies facing the uncertainty of litigation, has appointed William C. Marra as a director responsible for leading the company’s litigation finance strategy. Marra is a seasoned litigation funder and former U.S. Supreme Court clerk who will help Certum continue its mission of growing and redefining the litigation finance landscape.

Mill City Ventures III, Ltd. (“Mill City”) (NASDAQ:MCVT), a specialty short-term finance and non-bank lender, announced today that it extended an additional $1 million of short-term loan principal to Mustang Funding LLC d/b/a Mustang Litigation Funding (“Mustang”) and refinanced and extended earlier provided short-term loan principal.

LegalPay, India’s first and largest player in the legal financing industry, has announced the successful closure of its Rs 12 crore Interim Financing Bonds.

Funding is required for a claim involving a concession held by a state-of-the-art industrial facility utilizing leading technologies to recycle used tires into rubber raw material, rubber compound, and value-added rubber end products. The concession agreement is between the plaintiff and a quasi-governmental entity in the GCC region. The claim is likely to be the subject of an ICC arbitration.

Burford Capital Limited, the leading global finance and asset management firm focused on law, today releases the following statement in connection with the September 8, 2023 Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law (the “Ruling”) issued by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (the “Court”) in connection with the Petersen and Eton Park cases against the Republic of Argentina and YPF (the “Case” or the “YPF Litigation”).

The American Legal Finance Association (ALFA) objects on behalf of its 30 members to the Case Management Order No. 61 issued by U.S. District Judge M. Casey Rodgers on August 29, 2023 in the 3M Combat Arms Earplug Product Litigation. The Order prohibits claimants in the Litigation from obtaining consumer legal funding without court approval and does not cite any applicable factual basis or legal precedent for such an order. The Order was issued without providing any due process to ALFA members whose funding contracts are in demand by claimants.

Westfleet Advisors, the leading U.S. litigation finance advisory firm, announced today that it has expanded its executive team with the addition of Wendie Childress as Managing Director and Counsel. Ms. Childress was most recently an Investment Advisor at commercial litigation funder Validity Finance, where she forged and deepened relationships throughout the U.S. legal market and advised parties seeking funding through all stages of the process. 

Silver Bull Resources Inc. (TSX: SVB, OTCQB: SVBL) (“Silver Bull” or the “Company”) is pleased to announce that it has secured funding for its international arbitration proceedings against the United Mexican States (“Mexico”) under the Agreement between the United States of America, Mexico, and Canada (the “USMCA”) and the North American Free Trade Agreement (“NAFTA”).

Delta Capital Partners Management, a global private equity firm specializing in litigation and legal finance, is pleased to announce that David Temporal has joined the company as its Chief Marketing Officer.  Temporal also will be a member of the firm’s Management Committee and its Investment Committee.

The following is a contributed piece by Ed Truant, founder of Slingshot Capital, Part 1 of this 2-part series can be found here. 

Litigation Capital Management Limited (AIM:LIT), a leading international alternative asset manager of disputes financing solutions, announces the outcome of the settlement reached in an Australian class action funded by it.

The following is a contributed piece by Ed Truant, founder of Slingshot Capital,

Executive Summary

• EDLC Investing is a relatively new, niche market requiring highly specialized skills
• EDLC has many advantages over CLF investing, although it is not a directly comparable investment strategy due to its application to publicly traded markets
• EDLC investing requires investors to have more of a buy/hold mentality than a ‘trader’ mentality due to the ‘fundamental’ risk being assumed
• Despite EDLC ‘events’ being non-correlated, the publicly listed security aspects of their portfolios add some level of correlation which will impact fund performance, both positively and negatively

A21-1338        Pamela Maslowski, Respondent, vs. Prospect Funding Partners LLC, et al., Appellants, vs. James Schwebel, Esq, et al., Respondents.

The Minnesota Supreme Court took a significant step to ensuring equal access to justice with their decision in Maslowski vs. Prospect Funding Partners LLC. yesterday, overturning the trial court and Court of Appeals holding and ruling unanimously that Consumer Litigation Funding is not subject to usury law as there is no absolute requirement to repay. In their decision, reversing the trial court and Court of Appeals, the Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that the repurchase rate in Prospect’s agreement was not subject to Minnesota’s usury statute. The American Legal Finance Association (ALFA) filed the only amicus curiae brief in this case on behalf of the interest of their members.

Omni Bridgeway Limited (ASX: OBL) (Omni Bridgeway, OBL, Group) has today released its results for the 12 months ended 30 June 2023 (FY23, Year).

Legal-Bay, The Pre Settlement Funding Company, announced today that Johnson & Johnson’s efforts to put a hold on the numerous lawsuits they are facing by filing bankruptcy have failed. Judge Kaplan ruled that the filing did not meet the requirements to qualify as a “good-faith” bankruptcy attempt, and was merely a way to seek protections against the billions of dollars the pharmaceutical giant will be expected to pay out in damages.

Legal-Bay, the Pre-Settlement Funding Company, announced an uptick in applications for settlement funding now that back-to-school season has begun. Now that summer is over and kids are heading back to school, many parents of college-aged children are faced with the added costs of tuition payments, textbooks, and travel expenses to-and-from campus, not to mention meals and housing once they get there.

Leading UK consumer law firm Slater and Gordon has agreed a £33 million committed facility with litigation funder and lender to law firms, Harbour, in what is believed to be one of the largest lending deals in the sector this year.

Litigation Finance Journal is well-regarded as the leading publication covering the global legal funding sector, but what is perhaps less-well known is that LFJ also serves as a digital hub for industry stakeholders to connect, via our informal introductory services. A recent example illustrates the impact that LFJs access to the global funding community can have, as Brazilian attorney and activist Daniel Cavalcante leveraged our introductory services to raise funding for a claim on behalf of Indigenous communities in the Amazon. 

In a bid to decongest the Indian legal system, LegalPay, India’s largest litigation financier has launched an Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) wing called Bharat Dispute Resolution (BDR).

The Frankfurt-based litigation financing company LF Legal Finance SE, through its subsidiary Legal Finance International GmbH (Düsseldorf), has acquired an option to finance an international tort case with a value in dispute of up to EUR 1.0 million. If the case is financed and won, Legal Finance expects significant cash inflows.