Credit facility for bankruptcy estate costs

Company challenge

Insolvent estates are regularly in the position of needing to secure financing to manage and maximize the value of their claims, but complex insolvencies are not always a good fit for simple case financing. Grant Thornton, a leading professional services company, needed financing across a portfolio of insolvency cases in which its partners were trustees.

Burford legal finance solution

Burford developed an innovative financing arrangement with Grant Thornton to provide a £9 million facility against one insolvent estate’s litigation portfolio.

Legal finance impact

The arrangement permitted Grant Thornton the flexibility to administer all of the claims by and against the estate instead of being limited to funding legal fees for claims, as is the case in standard insolvency arrangements. The portfolio design accommodated defense costs, declaratory matters and administration costs. The portfolio structure also obviated the need to deal with financing cases on a one-by-one basis and marked a shift from traditional third-party funding of legal fees to the financing of the whole estate.