David Kay

A well-known lawyer and investment banker, David Kay is the Executive Chairman and Chief Investment Officer of Liti Capital, a Swiss investment company that combines blockchain-based solutions, advanced data analytics and investigative capabilities to conduct litigation funding. David is considered one of the most successful and in-demand litigation finance strategists in the history of the 15-year-old litigation finance industry and he led one of the largest international arbitration award in history – bringing in more than one billion US dollars of cash and securities.

Before joining Liti Capital in 2021, David provided board representation, corporate governance, capital raising, and strategic planning advisory services to several public and private multi-billion dollar organizations. He has proven expertise in complex conflict management and financing processes across various sectors, including but not limited to: multi-jurisdictional litigation and/or arbitration, international law issues, governmental contracts or disputes, judgement enforcement, and forensic asset-tracing.

For the better part of the last decade, David was also a Founding Partner and the Portfolio Manager of a US$1 billion+ private equity fund focused on investing in complex commercial litigations and arbitrations around the globe. While at the fund, David conceived and developed an investment strategy that focused on investing in (i) international commercial litigations and arbitrations and (ii) other complex special situations.

This strategy was realized by successfully raising two funds, providing the opportunity to create outsized, non-market correlated returns via strategic investments where there was both (i) a strong risk-adjusted return and (ii) an ability to directly/positively impact the outcome. David led the deployment of capital at the funds, and he was responsible for building out the entire team and executing the strategy across approximately 40 investments in more than 17 countries.

Prior to that fund experience, David served in the Restructuring and Recapitalization Group at the Jeferies Financial Group. In that role, he was responsible for analyzing and facilitating corporate restructurings, with an emphasis on advising corporate clients and their creditors in large, multifaceted transactions. Representative engagements included: Nortel Networks, The Trump Organization, Verasun Energy Corporation, Delphi Corporation and Hard Rock Park.

He also practiced law as an attorney at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP in the Financial Restructuring Group, where he focused on advising creditors committees and bondholder committees in complex corporate restructurings, both out of court and in Chapter 11.

Representative cases included: Delta Airlines, Loral Space & Communications, Calpine Corporation, Anchor Glass Container Corporation and Vertis Communications.David earned his Bachelor of Arts in International Relations from the University of Pennsylvania. He earned his Juris Doctor, cum laude, from Fordham University School of Law, where he made the Dean’s List and wrote for the Urban Law Journal.

In an recent interview with Dinis Guarda, David Kay said the following about: Democratising Finance.

“Most people that are watching this when they hear that litigation financing is best performing asset class, think: I would have heard of that? You know why they haven’t heard about it? Because 99.9% of the world isn’t allowed to invest in it, today, ok? And my parents, going back to the beginning, were not allowed to invest in my fund. They couldn’t. It was one of the biggest disputes I had when I was there. They did not have a million dollars of liquidity, and they could not participate. So, when we were sitting down to form Liti Cap, Jonas was saying you gotta do this, you gotta jump in this with me, there were a couple things we talked about. The first thing and the most important thing from a bridge, from my perspective, is everybody should have the right to invest in private equity, ok? The democratisation of private equity is critical.”