Litigation Funders Class Action Claim Dropped

In news that has pleased the stock market in London, litigation funding providers Burford Capital have recently announced that the class action claim made by its investors has been abandoned. The class action claim had originally been made via by New York based investor claims specialists Rosen Law, with the legal action alleging that Burford, one of the world’s largest litigation funders, had made false and/or misleading statements on its financial returns.

Burford had strenuously denied making any such false statements and denied that their business was facing financial difficulty. Burford reported to the London Stock Exchange in early January that the US securities action filed in August last year has been withdrawn and dismissed in its entirety. Burford also confirmed that there was no further litigation pending against it at present, other than ‘ordinary course skirmishing’ within a small number of ongoing funded investment matters.

In response to additional shareholder inquiries, Burford has also confirmed it will provide in its 2019 annual report information about management compensation (including individual compensation disclosure for chief executive Christopher Bogart and chief investment officer Jonathan Molot) consistent with the disclosure obligations to which it will be subject under its planned 2020 US listing, even though those obligations will not yet have taken effect. The company’s full year results for the year ended 31 December will be released on 24 March 2020. A spokesperson for Muddy Waters, the short-selling firm who were a driving force behind the class action, said:

We would also caution anyone against interpreting the litigation dismissal as affirmation that there is no misleading conduct or wrong-doing at the company. It is nothing more than the reality of the US being overly litigious. Lawsuits get filed and dismissed all the time, which in this case is ironic, given Burford’s own contribution to the clogged toilet that is the US court system.”

Commercial Litigation Funding

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