850
Opinion of the Court
does not exist"); see also In re Temple, 851 F. 2d 1269, 1272 (CA11 1988) ("Without a finding as to the net worth of the defendant, it is difficult to see how the fact of a limited fund could have been established given that all of [the defendant's] assets are potentially available to suitors"); In re Dennis Greenman Securities Litigation, 829 F. 2d 1539, 1546 (CA11 1987) (discussing factual findings necessary for certification of a limited fund class action).
We have already alluded to the difficulties facing limited fund treatment of huge numbers of actions for unliquidated damages arising from mass torts, the first such hurdle being a computation of the total claims. It is simply not a matter of adding up the liquidated amounts, as in the models of limited fund actions. Although we might assume, arguendo, that prior judicial experience with asbestos claims would allow a court to make a sufficiently reliable determination of the probable total, the District Court here apparently thought otherwise, concluding that "there is no way to predict Fibreboard's future asbestos liability with any certainty." 162 F. R. D., at 528. Nothing turns on this conclusion, however, since there was no adequate demonstration of the second element required for limited fund treatment, the upper limit of the fund itself, without which no showing of insufficiency is possible.
The "fund" in this case comprised both the general assets of Fibreboard and the insurance assets provided by the two policies, see 90 F. 3d, at 982 (describing the fund as Fibreboard's entire equity and $2 billion in insurance assets under the Trilateral Settlement Agreement). As to Fibreboard's assets exclusive of the contested insurance, the District Court and the Fifth Circuit concluded that Fibreboard had a then-current sale value of $235 million that could be devoted to the limited fund. While that estimate may have been conservative,28 at least the District Court heard evi-28 The District Court based the $235 million figure on evidence provided by an investment banker regarding what a "financially prudent buyer" would pay to acquire Fibreboard free of its personal injury asbestos liabili-
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