Third-party litigation funder Burford Capital took advantage of favorable news from the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday to announce the sale of a 10% share in one of its investments for $100 million.

This is not the first time that Burford has offloaded a stake in the case, Argentine Republic v. Petersen Energia Inversora S.A.U., which involves a bankrupt investor in one-time state-owned petroleum company YPF suing Argentina and the company over its 2012 expropriation. But now that the Supreme Court has elected not to hear an appeal over whether U.S. courts had jurisdiction over the matter, the value of the case is growing.

Burford first sold a 10% share in the Petersen case in a sale that closed in December 2016 and March 2017 for $40 million, and the latest sale reflects a 150% increase in value.

Burford CEO Christopher Bogart said that he was not aware of any of Burford's peers in the litigation funding space taking advantage of a secondary market for claims.

“It's something that we've been talking about developing for the last several years,” he said. “The funding challenge we have is that capital flows in litigation finance are difficult to predict.”

Specifically, the uncertain timing of the resolution of cases—via settlements or rulings—stands in the way of Burford and other third-party funders to take full advantage of their capital.

As a result of the deal announced Monday, Burford now controls a 61.25% share of the Petersen case. Burford says that it has always committed to hold at least 50.1% of its original stake in the matter.

The sales allow Burford to keep its portfolio diversified and deploy its resources elsewhere. According to Bogart, such use of a secondary investment marketplace is common in more traditional business, like mutual funds.

“It goes to the continued maturity of law broadly and litigation finance more specifically,” he said. “The application of other very basic capital market techniques shouldn't be a surprise to anybody. But it's new to law.”

Eleven institutional investors bought stakes in the latest sale, and approximately 40 total institutional investors now have an interest in the Petersen case. They all now have a share in the upside of what is a high-risk, high-reward proposition.

“They're not in the business of putting up $100 million all on binary risk,” Bogart said.

But the Supreme Court's decision helped eliminate one avenue of risk, by closing the door on the jurisdictional question. The court's move became more predictable last month, when the solicitor general, responding to the court, filed a brief arguing that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit correctly concluded that the claims were protected by the “commercial activity” exception to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act.

That gave Burford and the investors enough confidence to negotiate a deal that would be contingent on the high court ultimately ruling in Petersen's favor.

The appeals court in July 2018 ruled in favor of Petersen, which had accumulated a 25% stake in YPF starting 15 years after the Argentine government privatized the company in 1993. After repossessing the shares in the company, the government cancelled dividend payments, prompting Petersen to default on loan obligations.

Both sides have deployed significant litigation firepower on the case, with YPF and Argentina turning to Cravath, Swaine & Moore and Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, and Petersen putting its faith in Washington, D.C., litigation boutique Kellogg, Hansen, Todd, Figel & Frederick.

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