INTRODUCTION Contributed by: Gary Born and Matteo Angelini, WilmerHale
WilmerHale 49 Park Lane
London W1K 1PS United Kingdom Tel: +44 0 20 7872 1000 Email: gary.born@wilmerhale.com Web: www.wilmerhale.com
Litigation in 2025 The global economy appears to have turned a corner in 2024. The combination of declining inflation, decreasing interest rates and more accommodative monetary policies in most G20 economies has strengthened international trade and led to a steady global GDP growth of over 3% in 2024. This has led many corporations to increase their litigation spend and budgets, and to an increased appetite for litigation. Whilst the global economy shows signs of improvement, the global litigation landscape continues to be dominated by significant geopo- litical risk: Russia and Belarus-related sanctions have impacted commercial activity across the globe, while energy and climate change-relat- ed regulation and conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East continue to be politically polarising London remains a popular choice for dispute resolution. It is the world’s leading centre for international dispute resolution by litigation and, equally with Singapore, by arbitration, according to the Queen Mary University of London Interna- tional Arbitration Survey. issues. Europe
In Europe, one major change is the facilitation of collective or class actions. Under the Rep- resentative Actions Directive, all EU member states are now required to have at least one procedural mechanism in place for consumers to seek collective redress. Recent data shows a continuous and dramatic rise in class actions being filed in Europe in recent years, with 133 class actions filed in 2023. This is a record-high number, and represents a 93% increase in class actions from 2019. The UK has experienced a similar relentless growth in class actions. According to one recent survey, up to the end of 2023, competition class actions involving over 500 million class members were filed in the UK, with claimed quantum now exceeding GBP120 billion. In Europe, a number of EU member states con- tinue to seek to attract litigation cases that tra- ditionally go to the English courts. France and the Netherlands have created their own spe- cialist commercial courts where judges have experience in private international law to cater to international disputes. Germany has estab- lished English-speaking commercial courts, and Switzerland is taking similar steps. Starting from 1 January 2025, cantons in Switzerland will be permitted to establish international commercial
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