litigation funding

Subscribe to litigation funding via RSS

Class actions are of course much more a feature of the litigation scene in the U.S. than in the U.K, but things have been changing in recent years. The most significant initial change in direction toward collective actions in the U.K. was the adoption several years ago of “opt-out” actions in the U.K. Competition Appeal Tribunal proceedings. More recently, through its courts’ use of group litigation orders (GLOs), there has been a “surge in mass claims” in the U.K., according to a recent law memo. The result has been, according to the October 13, 2025, memo from the Skadden law firm, a “dramatic transformation” over the past decade in the U.K. of its “collective redress landscape.” The memo, which is entitled “Class Actions by the Backdoor? The Evolving Landscape of Group Litigation in the U.K,” can be found here.Continue Reading “Backdoor Class Actions”: Proliferating U.K. Collective Action Proceedings

Sarah Abrams

Litigation funding as a topic has been around for years, but it recently has been back in the headlines of the business pages. In light of the recent renewed focus on litigation funding, Sarah Abrams, Head of Claims Baleen Specialty, a division of Bowhead Specialty, explores the background regarding litigation finance and considers the implications for D&O insurers. I would like to thank Sarah for allowing me to publish her article as a guest post on this site. I welcome guest post submissions from responsible authors on topics of interest for this site’s readers. Please contact me directly if you would like to submit a guest post. Here is Sarah’s article. Continue Reading Guest Post: Litigation Finance (Litigation Funding)

It has been a while since I have had occasion to write about third-partly litigation financing. However, recent developments at the SEC, in which the agency has pursued enforcement actions alleging that various purported vehicles to finance litigation had defrauded prospective investors, have brought litigation funding back onto my radar screen. Once again, as in the past, various groups are sounding alarm bells about third-party litigation funding, as discussed below.Continue Reading Litigation Funding in the Spotlight

Nessim Mezrahi

In the following guest post, Nessim Mezrahi discusses the need for transparency in third-party litigation funding arrangements and judicial scrutiny on short-seller reports relied on by plaintiff securities class action attorneys. Nessim is cofounder and CEO of SAR, a securities class action data analytics and software company. A version of this article previously was published on Law360. I would like to thank Nessim for allowing me to publish his article as a guest post on this site. I welcome guest post submissions from responsible authors on topics of interest to this site’s readers. Please contact me directly if you would like to submit a guest post. Here is Nessim’s article.
Continue Reading Guest Post: Funder, Short-Seller Use Undermines Securities Class Actions

As I have noted in prior posts (most recently here), one of the more interesting and noteworthy developments in recent years has been the rise of collective investor actions outside the United States. A recent white paper published by Allianz Global Corporate & Specialty SE in collaboration with the Clyde & Co law firm entitled “Collective Actions and Litigation Funding and the Impact on Securities Claims: A Global Snapshot” takes a detailed look at the spread and development of collective investor actions – including, in at least some jurisdictions, securities class actions – against corporations and their directors and officers and the interrelation between this development and litigation funding. The report also includes a detailed picture of the status of collective actions and litigation funding in 28 different countries. The white paper can be found here.
Continue Reading A “Snapshot” of the Global Rise of Collective Investor Actions

Last August, when prominent litigation funding firm Burford Capital Ltd. was hit with as securities class action lawsuit, I published a post highlighting the new suit. In a post in which I arguably had some fun at Burford’s expense – the post was entitled “Isn’t It Ironic? Litigation Funding Firm Hit With Securities Suit” – I detailed the shareholder plaintiff’s allegations. Having drawn readers’ attention to the lawsuit, it seems only fair for me now to point out to readers what subsequently happened in the lawsuit. The fact is, the plaintiff has voluntarily dismissed the lawsuit, albeit without prejudice.
Continue Reading Fair is Fair: Securities Suit Against Burford Capital Voluntarily Dismissed

In a development that some may find more than a little bit ironic, U.K.-based litigation finance firm Burford Capital has been hit with a securities class action lawsuit following a drop in its share price after a short seller published a report questioning the company’s financial reporting. Burford has denied the short seller’s allegations and has also raised interesting questions about trading in its securities at the time of the research report’s release. A copy of the August 21, 2019 complaint filed against the company and certain of its executives can be found here.
Continue Reading Isn’t It Ironic? Litigation Funding Firm Hit With Securities Suit

It is big news when one of the most successful plaintiff-side corporate and securities lawyers decides to walk away from the game, but that is exactly what Stuart Grant of Grant & Eisenhofer, the Delaware shareholder litigation firm, is going to do. According to Alison Frankel’s interesting June 25, 2018 Reuters article and interview (here), Grant is leaving his firm effective June 30, 2018, because, in his own words, he doesn’t like losing, as he has been doing in the past few years. Both Grant’s reasons for leaving and his plans for what comes next are interesting. In his interview with Frankel, Grant also had a number of interesting things to say about a number of corporate and securities litigation topics.
Continue Reading A Plaintiff Lawyer Withdraws Because the Thrill is Gone

One of the many issues under discussion when the question of litigation financing regulation comes up is whether parties’ use of litigation financing must be disclosed. One federal district court has implemented provisions requiring the disclosure of litigation financing, and the state of Wisconsin recently adopted measures requiring litigation financing disclosure. The federal Advisory Committee on the Rules of Civil Procedure is separately studying measures that would require disclosure. In the meantime, other courts continue to struggle with the disclosure issue. The federal district court judge in Ohio presiding over the multidistrict opioid litigation has fashioned his own litigation financing disclosure approach; Northern District of Ohio Judge Dan Aaron Polster has ordered the litigants in the opioid litigation to provide litigation funding disclosure to the court itself, rather than to the parties. Interestingly, this approach has drawn praise from a leading third-party litigation funder, as discussed below. Judge Polster’s May 7, 2018 order can be found here.
Continue Reading Federal Judge Orders Litigation Funding Disclosure to the Court, Rather than to Opposing Parties

Third-party litigation funding has its critics and detractors (refer, for example, here and here). The fact is that third-party litigation funding is now well-established and is here to stay. A recent survey by one of the leading funding firms, discussed below, confirms that the acceptance and use of litigation funding is growing rapidly. The more interesting question at this point is — what are the implications?
Continue Reading Thinking About the Growth of Third-Party Litigation Financing