The financing of legal actions by third parties has grown exponentially since the early 2000s and is now common across many common law and civil law jurisdictions. It is still in its infancy in Qatar, but the Qatar International Centre for Conciliation and Arbitration (the “QICCA”) expressly recognised third party dispute funding in its 2024 rules update (the “QICCA Rules”).

This article seeks to provide a brief introduction to third party funding, and how it can make justice more accessible in a time when arbitration has become an expensive endeavour. While third party dispute funding may allow greater access to arbitration, it requires a careful balancing act between the interests of the claim’s stakeholders, and indeed those of the adverse party, with private equity investment demands.

Continue Reading Qatar Third-Party Dispute Funding: An Introduction

Seeking to protect their investments in the face of increased liability management exercises, lenders began signing “cooperation agreements,” which required the lenders to cooperate when negotiating to restructure existing debt or provide new debt to their shared borrower. These cooperation agreements protect lenders from “creditor-on-creditor violence” — when one lender (or a subset of lenders) renegotiates with a borrower to the benefit of the negotiating lender and the detriment of the others.

In November 2025, Optimum Communications, Inc. (f/k/a Altice) and CSC Holdings, LLC (together, Optimum) filed a federal antitrust lawsuit against its lenders — Apollo, Ares, GoldenTree, Loomis, Oaktree, and PGIM (collectively, the Cooperative) — challenging their cooperation agreement as an unlawful cartel. In the complaint, Optimum alleges two antitrust theories: (i) the Cooperation Agreement constituted a group boycott of Optimum because the Cooperative members agreed not to individually work with Optimum to restructure debt absent supermajority approval from the Cooperative, and (ii) the Cooperation Agreement constituted an unlawful price-fixing scheme by requiring the Cooperative’s steering committee to negotiate with Optimum exclusively, rather than allow Optimum to negotiate individual discounts with individual lenders. Optimum alleges that because the Cooperative controls approximately 88% of the entire leveraged finance market and 99% of Optimum’s outstanding debt, the Cooperation Agreement has made it incredibly difficult for Optimum to restructure its debt.

Continue Reading Optimum’s Shot Across the Bow: An Antitrust Challenge to Cooperation Agreements

Asset-based lending (ABL) and adjacent areas of asset-focused finance continually shift towards the center ground of mainstream corporate finance. Flexibility, underpinned by collateral-driven risk, is in demand. The market continues to diverge (in some instances, becoming even more finely-tuned to complex credit, special situations, and restructuring), but its growth is generally well documented, with regulatory capital treatment and multiple other drivers potentially accelerating the same, particularly outside of the traditional banking sector.

So, what should modern stakeholders look out for? ABL structures typically feature fewer traditional financial covenants than cash-flow lending, but involve real operational visibility, asset monitoring, and dynamic controls. Generally, these activate far more swiftly than a conventional financial covenant breach in a heavier term loan structure.

Continue Reading Asset-Based Lending: At Times Covenant-Lite, but Not Control-Lite

On December 19, 2025, New York Governor Kathy Hochul vetoed a bill that would have amended the New York LLC Transparency Act (“New York Act”) to include beneficial ownership information (“BOI”) reporting requirements for all non-U.S. and U.S. limited liability companies (“LLCs”) registered to do business in New York State (“New York”).

The Governor’s veto means that the New York Act willonly require disclosure of BOI only for non-U.S. LLCs registered to do in business in New York that do not otherwise qualify for any of the exemptions in the New York Act, and only with respect to non-U.S. beneficial owners.

Continue Reading Governor’s Veto Limits Scope of New York LLC Transparency Act to Foreign LLCs Registered in New York

In an effort to improve market efficiency and to speed settlement, the Loan Syndications and Trading Association (the “LSTA”) is proposing amendments to its trading documents in order to address concerns that market participants are increasingly failing to make timely payment of the “Purchase Price” with respect to their bank loan trade settlements. Although typically only one or two days late, such failures, on a large scale, can prove to be quite costly to loan sellers and disruptive to the market as a whole. The proposal would introduce language into the LSTA Standard Terms and Conditions for its suite of trade confirmations (the “Standard Terms”) that would require tardy loan buyers to pay a “Late Payment Fee.”

Continue Reading LSTA Proposes Introduction of Late Payment Fees in Loan Trade Transactions

According to reports, Saks Global Enterprises, a leader in luxury retail, is preparing to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection imminently. Saks houses such iconic brands as Saks Fifth Avenue, Bergdorf Goodman, and Neiman Marcus. Despite a recent recapitalization, the filing by this iconic company should not be a surprise to those following the industry closely. Retail has continued to face increased costs due to tariffs, inflationary pressures, ballooning consumer debt, and the continued rise of e-commerce competitors (including the upstart Quince). Total debt throughout the Saks enterprise is said to exceed $6 billion. The filing, when it comes, will follow a year-end missed interest payment in respect of certain notes, a sure signal of restructuring activity to come.

For lenders, landlords, suppliers, and other creditors, early preparation for a bankruptcy filing, and taking decisive steps during any bankruptcy case, will be critical to protecting interests and maximizing recoveries.

Continue Reading Saks Global Enterprises Bankruptcy: What Creditors Need to Know Now

Paul Pollock was recently quoted in a Pensions & Investments article that covers the outlook for private equity firms in 2026 across deals, exits, and fundraising.

The article reads:

Even as deal activity improved in 2025, with nearly $900 billion in deal activity through the third quarter, the private equity ecosystem is largely still unsatisfied, according to Paul Pollock, a partner at Crowell & Moring, a law firm focused on middle-market private equity firms.

“The industry consensus is it has to get better. And the industry’s been saying that now for two years because there really has not been a lot of deal volume in the last couple of years,” Pollock said. “You know, interest rates are too high, multiples have been too high. A lot of it is a hangover for the buyout frenzy that happened immediately after the pandemic.”

Continue Reading Crowell’s Paul Pollock Quoted in Pensions & Investments Article on Private Equity

Yesterday, FinCEN announced an ongoing enforcement initiative against more than 100 money services businesses (“MSBs”) operating along the Southwest U.S. border. FinCEN says that it reviewed over one million currency transaction reports (“CTRs”) and 87,000 suspicious activity reports (“SARs”) using new data processing techniques to identify potential Bank Secrecy Act (“BSA”) compliance concerns with MSBs there. The agency says this resulted in six FinCEN Notices of Investigation, “dozens” of referrals to the IRS, and 50 compliance outreach letters. An accompanying video from Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent suggests that the initiative is intended to “stop terrorist cartels, drug traffickers, and human smugglers” and to “root out potential cartel-related money laundering from the U.S. financial system.”

Continue Reading FinCEN Announces Enforcement Initiative for MSBs Along the Southwest Border

Paul Haskel was recently quoted in an American Lawyer article that explores trends and new approaches in law firm finance. The article discusses various methods of funding utilized by law firms, including debt finance from traditional financial institutions and, more recently, private capital.

Paul commented, “Currently, most firms who have little cash on hand tend to have lines of credit from which to borrow to get them through any given year, and firms in need of immediate capital infusions typically borrow through traditional banks and financial institutions, and increasingly from litigation funders. A lot of law firms typically do borrow to meet their cash needs because they get generally depleted during the course of the year, and they distribute money to their partners in January, and then they have no cash.”

Click here to read the article.

The use of management service organizations (MSOs) in the law firm space is a new and expanding trend. While uncertainties whether MSOs comply with legal ethical rules remain, with only one decision from the Texas Commission on Professional Ethics touching on the issue so far, continued use of MSOs in law firm transactions is expected.

The litigation funder, Burford Capital, expressed its intention to purchase minority stakes in U.S. law firms. And, more recently, AmLaw 50 firm McDermott Will & Schulte has announced that it is in preliminary discussions regarding a potential restructuring in which it would sell a portion of its operations to a third-party investor.

Crowell’s Paul Haskel and Paul Pollock recently published an article in Bloomberg Law exploring these topics and the legal and regulatory hurdles faced by non-professionals seeking ownership and operation of MSOs.

Click here to read the article.