Bar Exam Toolbox Podcast Episode 167: Listen and Learn -- Direct and Derivative Actions (Corporations)
Board Diversity Podcast
Securities Litigation and Disclosure Issues
Podcast: CFTC Issues LIBOR Transition Relief for Swaps
On August 14, 2024, Judge Michael T. Liburdi of the United States District Court for the District of Arizona granted with leave to amend a motion to dismiss a shareholder derivative suit brought in the name of the company, a...more
In Re Orbit/FR, Inc. Stockholders Litig., C.A. No. 2018-0340-SG (Del. Ch. January 9, 2023) - In In re Primedia, Inc. S’holders Litig., 67 A.3d 455 (Del. Ch. 2013), the Court examined whether a litigation asset being...more
The Delaware Supreme Court recently affirmed a Court of Chancery ruling granting a Special Litigation Committee’s motion to terminate a shareholder derivative action that had survived a motion to dismiss. The split decision...more
The Situation: A number of shareholder derivative lawsuits in federal court have been filed seeking to hold directors and officers of major companies accountable for alleged failures to uphold their companies' stated...more
In Roels v. Valkenaar, a shareholder filed a shareholder derivative suit against former and current officers and directors of the company based on multiple claims of breach of fiduciary duty. No. 03-19-00502-CV, 2020 Tex....more
On April 27, 2020, the Delaware Court of Chancery for the third time in a year denied a motion to dismiss a Caremark claim. The case, Hughes v. Hu, involves a derivative claim against the audit committee and officers of a...more
Rule 23.1 of the Delaware Court of Chancery Rules requires a plaintiff asserting a shareholder derivative action to plead “with particularity the efforts, if any, made by the plaintiff to obtain the action the plaintiff...more
Consistent with trends in recent years, in 2019 Delaware corporation law largely was shaped by post-closing suits for money damages against directors who had approved mergers and acquisitions. Two Delaware Supreme Court...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: The Delaware Chancery Court’s October 1 In re Clovis decision marks the second time in 2019 that a Delaware court has permitted a Caremark duty-to-monitor derivative claim against directors—considered...more
In a recent case, Gammel v Immelt (2019 NY Slip Op 32005[U]), shareholders of General Electric Company (GE), brought a derivative shareholder action against the members of GE’s board of directors and various committees...more
Much has been written about the pleading requirements unique to shareholder derivative lawsuits. For example, a derivative complaint must allege the plaintiff’s standing as a shareholder at all relevant times. Demand upon the...more
In the consolidated stockholder derivative litigation, In re Fitbit, Inc., CA No. 2017-0402-JRS (Del. Ch. Dec. 14, 2018), the Delaware Court of Chancery denied the Defendants’ motion to dismiss Plaintiffs’ insider trading and...more
On March 15, 2019, Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster of the Delaware Court of Chancery declined to dismiss a derivative suit brought by minority stockholders of Pilgrim’s Pride Corporation (the “Company”) against the Company’s...more
In Liberty Bankers Life Ins. Co. v. Lenhard, a company sued its former chief executive officer and shareholder for breaching fiduciary duties and fraudulent statements regarding an agreement to transfer his stock in the...more
Shareholder of a Korean corporation (“Cuzco Korea”), the sole member of a chapter 11 limited liability company debtor (“Cuzco USA” or the “Debtor”), brought an adversary proceeding against the Debtor and others, asserting...more
The Delaware Supreme Court held yesterday that the dismissal of a shareholder derivative action for lack of demand futility can preclude other derivative actions as long as the plaintiff in the dismissed case adequately...more
In a shareholder derivative action, to survive a motion to dismiss for failure to plead facts showing demand futility, a derivative plaintiff must plead particularized facts showing either actual involvement by a majority of...more
On June 28, 2017, Vice Chancellor Tamika Montgomery-Reeves of the Delaware Court of Chancery declined to dismiss purported derivative and direct stockholder claims for breaches of fiduciary duty against the directors of...more
We previously reported that Wendy’s was hit with a putative class action shareholders’ derivative suit in December following its data breach in 2016. Late last week, the executives and Board of Wendy’s filed a Motion to...more
In October 2016, the Delaware Court of Chancery rejected a shareholder derivative lawsuit premised on an alleged lack of oversight by the directors of Capital One Financial Corp., Reiter v. Fairbank, C.A. No. 11693-CB, 2016...more
Vice Chancellor Glasscock has held that a merger designed to eliminate derivative claims against a majority of directors justified the application of the entire fairness standard of review in a direct challenge to the merger....more
As we have previously discussed, there has been a growing trend of corporations’ adopting various types of bylaws to define the bounds of shareholder litigation. These include forum-selection bylaws and fee-shifting bylaws...more
In what is believed to be the first case nationwide seeking to strike down a groundbreaking corporate bylaw aimed at combatting frivolous shareholder class actions, Emergent Capital, Inc., has secured the dismissal with...more
Two recent decisions from the Delaware Court of Chancery have dusted off the venerable doctrine of collateral estoppel to dismiss stockholder claims. Of course, this issue is not new in Delaware. In 2013, the Delaware Supreme...more
Lawsuit Dismissed Where Defendant Hulu Did Not “Knowingly” Disclose Personal Identifying Information. In In re: Hulu Privacy Litigation, 2015 WL 1503506 (N.D. Cal. March 31, 2015), the plaintiffs alleged that Hulu had...more