Hey Lionel, great call in April '23 before the price ran (I'm new here). What's the game now for Burford?
Despite it being underpriced, seems like the market is in a wait and see mode. There is no confidence in Burford being able to claim overseas assets (nor does Burford seem to be moving much).
Chris Demuth seems to be just waiting for the new Argentinean president to start paying back - but is there any other catalysts that will allow Burford to claw back the money? Noticed in your question #8 above that most US based assets have limitations from being seized - so it's really just a waiting game for the president to give the green light?
On the YPF front, yes a bit of wait and see. BUR has other notable cases (eg, Sysco) though they just lost in their bid to sub out Sysco, as Sysco attempted to settle for a value that was not satisfactory to BUR. There are other food related price-fixing cases in their portfolio, but we don’t have a ton of detail on them.
It’s a bit dead money for now, but that could change any day. I suspect the next earnings report will show good progress on the collections front for other cases as the Covid court backlog continues to work itself out
Non-YPF, yes. Sysco specifically is tough because we still don’t know the total universe of claims and scope of damages. Plenty of folks saying food related claims could be $1B+, and I don’t think that’s unreasonable, but it’s still speculation at this point.
Haven’t read, but added to my to-do! Milei is positioning this as a sort of “socialist penalty.” It may not be good for the people of Argentina, but that may ultimately benefit Milei.
Still involved, but to a lesser degree. I think that article is well written but does not address the complexity of the situation (which is odd, given the author’s background). Writing off any recovery seems like a bit of an overstatement
Hey Lionel, great call in April '23 before the price ran (I'm new here). What's the game now for Burford?
Despite it being underpriced, seems like the market is in a wait and see mode. There is no confidence in Burford being able to claim overseas assets (nor does Burford seem to be moving much).
Chris Demuth seems to be just waiting for the new Argentinean president to start paying back - but is there any other catalysts that will allow Burford to claw back the money? Noticed in your question #8 above that most US based assets have limitations from being seized - so it's really just a waiting game for the president to give the green light?
On the YPF front, yes a bit of wait and see. BUR has other notable cases (eg, Sysco) though they just lost in their bid to sub out Sysco, as Sysco attempted to settle for a value that was not satisfactory to BUR. There are other food related price-fixing cases in their portfolio, but we don’t have a ton of detail on them.
It’s a bit dead money for now, but that could change any day. I suspect the next earnings report will show good progress on the collections front for other cases as the Covid court backlog continues to work itself out
Hi Lionel - have you done any work to value/underwrite Burford's non-Argentina business, including the Sysco antitrust litigation?
Non-YPF, yes. Sysco specifically is tough because we still don’t know the total universe of claims and scope of damages. Plenty of folks saying food related claims could be $1B+, and I don’t think that’s unreasonable, but it’s still speculation at this point.
Hi Lionel, have you read this story. My concern is the settlement will be very unpopular for the common people in Argentine , though today’s news show the president is quite supportive: https://open.substack.com/pub/bowtiedmara/p/ypf-the-laundromat-of-the-century?r=ag2rx&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
Haven’t read, but added to my to-do! Milei is positioning this as a sort of “socialist penalty.” It may not be good for the people of Argentina, but that may ultimately benefit Milei.
Hi Lionel,
Are you still involved in BUR, or have you moved on after they secured a win earlier this year?
If you are still tracking, perhaps you will find this article interesting - https://on.ft.com/4anI8rn
And congratulations on LQDA today! I held a small position just to track it (didn't feel smart enough to assess the technicalities there).
Cheers,
H Jay Simpson
Still involved, but to a lesser degree. I think that article is well written but does not address the complexity of the situation (which is odd, given the author’s background). Writing off any recovery seems like a bit of an overstatement