I don't think that's bilking at all. In the US we generally favor private enforcement over public regulation. E.g., the SEC doesn't go after every small bit of

I don't think that's bilking at all. In the US we generally favor private enforcement over public regulation. E.g., the SEC doesn't go after every small bit of fraud and dubious corporate behavior. They're the big guns, and the small stuff is dealt with via private lawsuit from investors who think they've been harmed. If we got rid of both private and public enforcement, fraud costs would balloon massively, costing the public wildly more. First for retail investors they were ever more often the suckers in the fraud, and then for everybody as we lose the robust public markets that are a major driver of business investment. Somebody's got to keep the greedy, amoral people in line. I'm not sure doing it via predatory lawyers is more efficient than skilled bureaucrats, but it's definitely more in line with the free market principles that tend to win out in the US.