The opt-out total was almost level with opt-ins and \u201cwill likely overtake it next year\u201d; opt-ins spiked in 2018 with the Mariana Dam litigation, the largest group action in the UK, arising from the collapse of a dam in Brazil.<\/p>\n
In 2016, there were 46m class members in two CAT actions, with a value of \u00a310bn \u2013 this would mainly have been the recently settled Merricks v Mastercard<\/em> case.<\/p>\n At the end of last year, there were more than 655m class members of CAT claims cumulatively worth \u00a395bn. There have been 56 brought since the new regime went live in 2015, of which two have been withdrawn and 20 consolidated with other claims, leaving 34 \u2018live\u2019 claims.<\/p>\n All are backed by a third-party litigation funder, with Bench Walk Advisers the most active, with 13 cases worth around \u00a313bn, but Burford Capital handling the biggest ones \u2013 the four cases it is funding, all involving \u2018Big Tech\u2019, are worth \u00a330bn.<\/p>\n Innsworth Capital is second on volume (nine cases worth \u00a310bn) and Fortress Investment Group second on value (\u00a315bn).<\/p>\n CMS \u2013 which comes from a defendant perspective \u2013 said England and Wales was the second largest third-party litigation funding market in the world. \u201cThis trend is expected to continue with anticipated growth of 8.7% per annum over five years, enlarging the market from \u00a32.2bn in 2023 to \u00a33.7bn by 2028.\u201d<\/p>\n The report said that despite the lower number of new actions last year, England and Wales accounted for just over a third of claims issued in Europe, followed by Portugal with 27%, well ahead of the Netherlands with 9%.<\/p>\n The total number of class action claims issued in Europe fell last year, from 128 to 97. Of the 97, 53 were opt-in and 44 opt-out, unlike the year before when a slender majority of claims were opt-out.<\/p>\n According to a class action \u2018risk map\u2019, the lowest risk countries were France, Ukraine, Switzerland, Croatia, Montenegro and North Macedonia.<\/p>\n In the UK, the three industry sectors most likely to be the subject of class actions were natural resources and energy, with just over \u00a341bn of claims, Big Tech with \u00a332bn and financial products with \u00a325bn.<\/p>\n Researchers said natural resources was \u201cmost exposed\u201d because of the Mariana Dam litigation.<\/p>\n For the first time, the data separated out claims specifically against \u2018Big Tech\u2019 and other tech industry defendants \u2013 the value of claims against the former was many times that of the latter.<\/p>\n Outside the UK, the picture in terms of industry sectors was very different. In Portugal, by far the biggest category of claims involved the aviation industry, followed by financial institutions and telecoms. In the Netherlands the most popular target for claims was Big Tech, followed by \u2018other tech\u2019, and after that the government.<\/p>\n Kenny Henderson, partner at CMS, described the 655m figure as \u201cextraordinary\u201d.<\/p>\n He continued: \u201cThe claims seek hundreds of millions of pounds, sometimes billions. Big Tech is targeted but so are other sectors such as financial services and utility providers such as water companies and train operators in the South-East. Any large corporate operating in the UK needs to take note: this is a real risk.<\/p>\n \u201cA big question is who is benefitting from all of this litigation. We are now seeing some early settlements, and it is expected that very low portions of settlements will go to the class members, sometimes 5% and lower.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n
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