Burford Punches Back at Insolvency Claims, Calls Muddy Waters Report ‘Deeply Disgusting’
Burford said that it will investigate Muddy Waters’ “false and misleading” report, claiming it shows signs of market manipulation.
August 08, 2019 at 12:34 PM
3 minute read
A day after an investment report called Burford Capital insolvent, causing its stock prices to plummet, the litigation funder struck back by claiming its initial investigation of the report shows signs of market manipulation.
Burford CEO Christopher Bogart said Muddy Waters’ tactics behind the report are “deeply disgusting,” adding that Burford has built its business around corporate governance and transparency.
“We are, after all, a firm run by lawyers,” Bogart said in an investor call Thursday morning held in response to the report. “These are things that are in our DNA. We know what it looks like when companies don’t do the right thing.”
A spokesperson for Muddy Waters, which takes investment positions from its research findings, said the company is reviewing Burford’s response before commenting.
Muddy Waters released the 25-page report Wednesday, causing Burford’s stock to plummet 65% before rallying later in the day on London’s AIM exchange. The due diligence-based investment firm had laid out seven different ways that Burford allegedly misrepresented the value of its investment portfolio. It also said Burford was a ”a poor business masquerading as a great one” and that it was “arguably already insolvent.”
In its written rebuttal, Burford said it will investigate Muddy Water’s actions, which show signs of market manipulation. “Short attacks such as this are a fundamental menace to an orderly market and to the value inherent in long-term investing in companies such as Burford that are revolutionising industries,” Burford wrote.
Burford said it’s remarkable the report was fueled by its own expanded investment disclosures, which the litigation funder began publishing in March to provide more transparency. “Muddy Waters would have investors believe that Burford has been engaged in a multiyear pattern of deception and misrepresentation that has only been revealed by Burford’s own election to provide even more transparency into its business—hardly sensible conduct for a business ‘egregiously misrepresenting’ itself as Muddy Waters claims,” the company wrote.
Bogart also referred to Muddy Water’s claims that the company was virtually insolvent as a red herring, pointing to the company’s reporting of expected outflows and access to multiple sources of capital to grow the business.
“To get to that conclusion, you need to ignore cash and management fee income,” he said. “You need to assume that we won’t have any more investment realizations, you need to assume that we would disclose all of our commitments right away. That’s the math the report does on its final page to conclude that we’re insolvent.”
In response to Muddy Waters’ claims that the company mainly invested in illiquid assets, Chief Investment Officer Jonathan Molot said that less than $1 million in proceeds are from noncash cases, compared to the more than $1 billion in proceeds the company has generated over the decade its been in business. He also noted that if a case is ongoing, it is not included on the concluded investment table.
“The costs go out and proceeds come in, and we only count them in the concluded investment table when the proceeds come in and the litigation is concluded,” Molot said on the call.
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