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Key Takeaways from LFJ’s Podcast with Steve Shinn

December 13, 2021

Key Takeaways from LFJ’s Podcast with Steve Shinn

On the latest episode of the LFJ Podcast, Steven Shinn, founder of FinLegal, described the solutions his platform provides for both funders and lawyers, and explains his company’s points of differentiation with other third party platform providers.

Q: Why move into litigation funding and after-the-event insurance? Can you explain how FinLegal’s offerings are different than those of traditional funders?

A: Absolutely. I think one of the challenges is that the litigation funding market could grow a great deal. But there are challenges where lawyers don’t necessarily understand litigation funding, and there are a lot more funders that you can go to. So you want to help educate people who are new to litigation funding and ATE about how to access it and how it works.

There are more funders joining, which is increasing the number of claims that get funded. So whereas before you might have only had funders looking to deploy $5 million to a claim, you now find situations where there are funders who want to deploy as little as $100,000 or less. So there’s a much broader range of funders…and it’s hard to go to all of them individually and it’s hard to know who’s in the market.

We thought, let’s build a sticky platform which provides the law firm with visibility and control over those funding requests, and let’s give them an online process (to write the best possible funding request) in terms of how it’s positioned to the funders so that it does get funding. With lots of funders to navigate, let’s build a platform to help lawyers navigate them, help them understand it—and let’s help them put forward the request with the best possible positioning.

Q: You mentioned getting involved in group actions (the UK version of US-style class actions). What got you interested in that space particularly, and does your technology background in any way penetrate that space?

A: Definitely. It started out as me seeing the VW group claim, and also seeing cartel claims, price-fixing on football shirts, and things like this. With my technology background, I thought ‘Well, how are law firms doing this?’

I saw that they had a lot of off-line case management platforms, they use a lot of spreadsheets. You know these systems didn’t talk to each other. There’s a lot of manual effort and no mobile interfaces for claimants to interact with the law firm. So I thought, ‘We can build a platform that will enable that.’ Essentially, we’d be taking a completely fresh look at it. With a technology and software development background and a product development background. How do we build/provide something that enables lawyers to spend the least time possible working with each claim. We know that’s important to the economics of the claim—not having to spend a lot of manual effort on each claim.

So that’s what we produced, a solution that works on a management by exception basis, so essentially the claimant goes through an automated set of steps. And where they fall out of those steps or where they don’t meet certain criteria, only then do they need to get picked up by the law firm.

Q: I know you offer a claim automation solution, can you explain what this solution does?

A: The main benefit of the solution is that it increases the volume of clients. So what you tend to find, is if there’s a bad claimant experience, people fall out of the process. You’ve spent money on acquiring that claimant, you spend advertising pounds or dollars to get them into your funnel, to start working with them. But they become disenfranchised from your process, right? Or they don’t like getting a lot of phone calls, or they feel like the process is insecure and it happens via Email without clear instruction. So if you have a good online process, it increases the volume of clients. That’s the first thing.

And it reduces the amount of time spent per client also, because…the law firm is only working with clients who fall out of the automated process. It’s also plug-n-play, so if you want to start work on a new type of matter it might be that this week you’re building a book of emissions claimants, and the following week you want to launch a shareholder claim.

You can launch that from the platform in a matter of days and start book building. You’re not having to have lots of different contractors and different systems that you have to modify to start doing something new or different. You talk to us, we set it up for you, and then you manage it through an interface that you’re very familiar with.

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UK Competition Class Actions Face Tightening Scrutiny of Funders and Costs

The legal and economic foundations of opt-out competition claims in the United Kingdom are being tested with increasing rigour, as the Competition Appeal Tribunal and the appellate courts sharpen their examination of whether proceedings are proportionate, workable and genuinely beneficial to class members rather than to their advisers and funders.

As reported by Pinsent Masons, a series of recent decisions has established a markedly more demanding posture at the certification stage and beyond. In Mowi, the Tribunal declined to grant a collective proceedings order after concluding that the costs and benefits of the proposed proceedings did not support certification, expressing concern that any recovery might principally benefit legal advisers and funders rather than the represented class.

Other rulings have pressed on funder economics directly. The Tribunal approved a "drop hands" settlement in the Qualcomm proceedings — delivering no damages to an estimated 29 million consumers — only after close scrutiny and a finding that the claim had minimal prospects of success. In Innsworth, the High Court upheld limits on funder returns, confirming that a funder's profit must be assessed against the outcome actually delivered to the class and must represent a just and reasonable return.

Governance failures have also drawn consequences, with one case producing cost sanctions described as "unreasonable to a high degree" where funders withdrew without disclosure. Courts have separately warned that class representatives self-authorising fees at scale is undesirable and risks blurring the distinction between representative and funder interests.

The developments land alongside a government consultation on streamlining opt-out collective actions, open from 17 July to 25 September 2026, which is considering whether certification thresholds should place greater weight on proportionality and cost-benefit analysis.

Commercial

Legal Bay Expands Commercial Litigation Funding to Cryptocurrency Fraud Cases

Legal Bay LLC has extended its commercial litigation funding platform to cover cryptocurrency fraud claims, targeting a category of disputes in which claimants frequently hold substantial value that is illiquid or inaccessible while litigation proceeds.

According to a PR Newswire release, the new program is designed for victims of cyber and crypto-related fraud, allowing digital asset holders to access capital without liquidating holdings that are tied up in ongoing proceedings. The company said funding decisions typically arrive within 24 to 48 hours of documentation being submitted, and that the offering is available nationwide to plaintiffs, attorneys and commercial litigation clients.

Legal Bay chief executive Chris Janish said the firm believes it is "the first and most experienced company to evaluate and fund crypto cases nationwide," positioning the expansion as a first-mover step in a claim type that has grown alongside the broader digital asset market.

The move reflects a wider pattern in the funding industry, where capital providers have increasingly sought exposure to digital asset disputes — from exchange insolvencies and recovery actions to individual fraud claims — as the volume and complexity of such matters has risen. Cryptocurrency claims present a particular funding challenge: recovery can hinge on tracing assets across jurisdictions and counterparties, and claimants often face lengthy timelines with limited liquidity in the interim.

Legal Bay is a national provider of pre-settlement funding, commercial litigation funding and lawsuit funding. The company did not disclose the size of the capital allocation supporting the new program.

Commercial

Google Rivals Line Up Billions in EU Damages Claims as Funders Back the Wave

The European Commission's first enforcement action under the Digital Markets Act has opened the door to a fresh round of private damages litigation against Google, with third-party funders already positioned behind several of the claims.

As reported by Claims Journal, the $1 billion fine levied against Google for self-preferencing and restricting app developers has prompted price-comparison rivals across Europe to press for compensation, with the aggregate value of pending and prospective claims running into the billions.

Several actions are already well advanced. A Berlin court awarded German platform Idealo €465 million ($528.9 million) in November, and a Stockholm court in July ordered Google to pay roughly $1.97 billion including interest in the case brought by Sweden's PriceRunner. Italy's Moltiply Group, which operates Trovaprezzi.it, is seeking €2.97 billion, while U.K. comparison site Kelkoo is pursuing claims worth billions of pounds. Kelkoo chief executive Richard Stables said the company expects its claims "to be impacted somewhat by the DMA decision because it shows that Google is still self-referencing."

Litigation finance is a visible presence in the wave. LitFin is backing two claimant groups suing Google in Amsterdam over its shopping auctions, seeking more than $1 billion combined. LitFin chief operating officer Matej Pardo said "there are already a lot of these claims being filed, and probably more that are (being) prepared," while cautioning that such cases can take up to eight years to resolve.

Thomas Hoppner of Geradin Partners, which advised Idealo, said he expects the decision "will trigger a new wave of litigation." Google said it strongly disagrees with the lawsuits, describing the claimants as "companies looking for a payout instead of investing in their own products."