Stans Energy Corp V.HRE.H

Third Party Funding % take

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Third-party funding may attract controversy, but one thing is undisputed: the industry is growing, and growing fast. Burford Capital, the world’s biggest litigation funder, was founded by former Time Warner General Counsel Chris Bogart and former Latham & Watkins partner Selvyn Seidel in 2009. Registered in Guernsey, it is one of a handful of firms with at least $100m in its coffers to fund litigation and arbitration. Other big players include Juridica Investments Ltd, Calunius Capital, Allianz ProzessFinanz and Harbour Litigation Funding. The funding model has so far proved highly lucrative. Typically, funders will claim around 20 to 50 per cent of the recovery proceeds, while spending an average of $8m on each investment claim. Burford, which commits up to a quarter of its funds to international investment cases, saw its profits grow nine-fold from 2010 to 2011, while Juridica’s grew by nearly 600 per cent. For Bogart, this is a clear sign that the legal sphere was gasping for help. ‘I’ve done this full-time now for three-and-a-half years and the response has been extraordinary,’ he tells IBA Global Insight. ‘It clearly suggests there was a dramatic need for incremental capital into the legal market to make it work properly. What is going on is really a correction of a longstanding under-serving of the legal market.’