Structured Settlement Industry Panel Included 4structures.com LLC President

4structures.com LLC President John Darer participated in a panel on "The Perils of Recycled Structured Settlements" at the annual meeting of the National Structured Settlements Trade Association that took place in Charleston, South Carolina in April 2019.

In addition to his structured settlements and settlement planning practice, John Darer has devoted hundreds of hours of pro bono time as the Structured Settlement Watchdog since 2005,  John Darer and has written extensively about the topic of Structured Settlement Receivables. Recycled structured settlements are most commonly known to investors as structured settlement receivables and enter into Receivables Purchase Agreements when such investments are acquired.

John was joined on the panel by two lawyers who between them and their respective firms have represented annuity issuers and been involved in the majority of structured settlement secondary market litigation, Stephen R. Harris, Esq, a partner at the Philadelphia law firm of Cozen & O'Connor who published on the topic in the ABA Journal in December 2018 and Peter Vodola, Esq., a partner in Reardon Scanlon LLP in West Hartford CT. Susan Bowersox of Sage Consulting moderated.

 The topic is an important one for structured settlement brokers, settlement planners and their attorney and injury victim clients. Many of the latter have explored the use of structured settlement receivables as a supplement to or even as a direct alternative to structured settlements. Some have implemented the receivables as part of settlement plans for injury victims possibly without a clear explanation of the risks involved an dveen misrepresenting the receivav]bles as annuties. It is critical to understand the transactional risks and the potential professional exposure to those recommending them.

 In March 2017, John Darer and Eddie Stone, a Greenwich CT lawyer who has brought several lawsuits against settlement purchasers, addressed the Society of Settlement Planners (SSP) about secondary market conduct "Bad Practices in the Secondary Market; Who Gets Hurt? at the SSP Annual Meeting at the Vdara Hotel Las Vegas, Nevada.