Rosenblatt firm to raise 50m on Aim
LITIGATION funding firm Alvaro is planning to raise £50m by listing on the Alternative Investment Market this month in a move that could transform the way expensive cases are funded in the City.
Alvaro will be the first contingent litigation funding company with a UK focus to float when it lists on 16 December.
The firm will use the cash to fund shareholder disputes and breach of trust cases involving the banks, celebrity libel cases and multi-million pound divorce settlements.
The market is worth £25bn in the UK alone, some 70 per cent of which is available in London.
Alvaro is headed up by chief executive Ian Rosenblatt, 50, senior partner of City law firm Rosenblatt Solicitors, and non-executive chairman Richard Jewson, 65, the former managing director of Jewson, the timber and builders merchants.
Alvaro will not fund any Rosenblatt cases but will instead target other City law firms. The average investment in a case will be between £250,000 and £5m and only cases with a high likelihood of winning will be taken on.
Contingent litigation funding works in a similar way to conditional fee agreements, most commonly known as no win no fee cases, as the litigant does not pay if the case is lost.
However, they differ in that in the event of a win, the funder recovers his costs but can also share an agreed percentage of the winnings.
PETER LENARDOS
ARDEN PARTNERS
ALVARO’s financial adviser is David Shapton, a founding partner at Akur Partners.
A fan of Sunday league football and Olympic format triathlons, Shapton has enjoyed a meteoric rise in the City and, at the age of 31, has worked for BNP Paribas, CIBC World Markets and Numis Securities.
Among the IPOs and fundraisings he has worked on in recent years are Paternoster, CEB and Empire Online, with aggregate funds raised in excess of £1bn. He has worked with Ian Rosenblatt on a number of key deals.
Peter Lenardos, at Arden Partners, is the analyst covering Alvaro.
Lenardos (above) is a colourful figure in the City and has worked as an investment banker on both sides of the Atlantic raising more than $2bn in equity capital and advising on more than $10bn in M&A transactions.
He held partner level positions at two M&A boutiques in London before joining Arden in July 2009 to expand their financial services franchise. He regularly reports for CNBC Europe and Bloomberg TV.