David Perla, managing director at Burford Capital.(Courtesy photos)

As litigation finance continues its passage into the mainstream of legal practice, CFOs deserve some of the credit.

Burford Capital spoke with over 500 CFOs and senior finance professionals in the U.S., Canada and the U.K. for a new report and found that two-thirds of them were  ”very likely” to use litigation finance in the next two years.

Financial executives at bigger companies showed themselves to be even more open to using litigation finance, with 57.9% of CFOs at companies with revenues over $1 billion saying they were very likely to do so in the near future, compared with 34.3% at companies grossing less than $1 billion.

It's a sign that litigation finance isn't just for David versus Goliath matters any longer.

“Contrary to most people's intuition, the bigger the corporation, the more the CFO values the benefits that using legal capital can bring,” said David Perla, a managing director at Burford, which bills itself as the world's largest publicly traded litigation funder.

While over three-quarters of these CFOs and senior finance professionals said their companies had unenforced judgments valued at over $10 million, 63% of respondents said that they've chosen to pass on claims due to the impact of legal expenses on their bottom line.

The awareness that they have left a lucrative financial resource on the table makes them open to employing a new tool to unlock the value of these resources.

“CFOs at these large companies can look at these complex situations and understand how legal can be used as a financial asset just as inventory, real estate, or human capital can be used,” Perla said.

There's another factor on the horizon that suggests the appetite among CFOs for third party financing is likely to grow.

Roughly two-thirds of the individuals surveyed by Burford said that they would advocate a reduction of their legal budget, if the economy enters into a recession. A slightly larger majority said that would push them to increase their use of litigation finance.

“As the economy slows down, legal departments are going to be asked to do more with less,” said Perla, who recalled asking law firms to slash their fees by 10% as an associate general counsel with Monster.com during the early 2000's recession.

One way to do so is to use litigation finance to enforce judgments that are essentially sitting around, and using the returns to support existing operations.

“Yes, you'll give away some of the back end, but you'll have more to work with,” Perla said. “That's the sort of solution a CFO loves to hear.”

Read More

Is Litigation Financing the Next Big Thing for Legal Departments?

Why Arbitration Finance Will Become More Popular in 2019

Five Predictions for Litigation Finance in 2019