BUR

Burford is the dominant litigation-finance franchise, and the FY2025 numbers show exactly why this is a structurally lumpy business rather than a broken one. Revenue fell 24.3% to $413M and net income dropped 57.3% to $62.6M, but this follows a $1.09B/$611M FY2023 print driven by case resolutions — the MD&A explicitly attributes the FY2025 softness to court backlogs ('extensions of expected duration reduced the fair value of certain assets'), not deterioration in the underlying portfolio. Management emphasizes returns are 'generally uncorrelated to market conditions,' and the business model is intact: total assets grew 7.5% to $6.64B and the company secured credit-rating upgrades from both Moody's (Q2 2025) and S&P (Q3 2025), with successful debt offerings in July 2025 and January 2026 validating capital-markets access.

Valuation is the bull case. At $4.24, BUR trades at 0.38x book value ($2.45B equity / 219M shares = ~$11.19/share) and a 15.1x P/E on a depressed earnings year. P/S of 2.2x on trough revenue is reasonable for an asset-heavy financial. The balance sheet is sturdy — $566M cash (+20.5%), $2.45B equity, and retained earnings of $1.80B — though long-term debt grew 20.7% to $2.13B and liabilities-to-equity climbed to 1.44x, financing a growing book of capital-provision assets reported at fair value.