A year ago, I posited the question whether a derivative suit can survive a conversion. I raised that question in reference to Palkon v. Maffei, 2024 WL 678204 (Del. Ch. Feb. 20, 2024), in which the plaintiffs unsuccessfully...more
In 2002, the California Legislature created the Victims of Corporate Fraud Compensation Fund as part of the Corporate Disclosure Act. There are a number of conditions that must be met to receive a payout from the fund. One...more
Yesterday’s post concerned the recent decision by U.S. District Court Judge Charles R. Eskridge in Rowe v. Doris, 2025 WL 963590 (S.D. Tex. Mar. 31, 2025). The case involved claims arising from the merger of two Nevada...more
Bright-eyed Athena, the goddess of wisdom, was not birthed of a woman. Rather, she sprang from the head of Zeus after he swallowed Metis, the pre-Olympian goddess of wisdom...more
In Drulias v. 1st Century Bancshares, Inc. 30 Cal. App. 5th 696 (2018), the plaintiff was a shareholder in a Delaware corporation whose board of directors approved a merger agreement and at the same time adopted a forum...more
Last Friday, California headquartered Affirm Holdings, Inc. filed preliminary proxy materials for a special meeting of stockholders to consider a proposal to reincorporate from Delaware to Nevada. Affirm is joining several...more
Globe Photos, Inc. owned a portfolio of millions of images of celebrities and musicians, including Marilyn Monroe, the Beatles, and Jimi Hendrix, some taken by famous photographers such as Frank Worth. Despite these assets,...more
In speaking with a reporter earlier this year, I observed that this proxy season will tell whether DExit has legs. While not exactly, a flood, several well-known and lesser-known corporations have recently filed proxy...more
Delaware had barely birthed changes to Section 144 of its General Corporation Law when the Plumbers & Fitters Local 295 Pension Fund filed a complaint challenging those changes. The plaintiff seeks a declaration that the...more
Nevada's exculpatory statute, NRS 78.138(7), requires a plaintiff to both rebut a statutory presumption of good faith and prove a breach of fiduciary duty involving intentional misconduct, fraud, or a knowing violation of the...more
The ink has barely dried on Delaware's hotly debated amendments to its General Corporation Law and already another company has proposed reincorporation in Nevada. In preliminary proxy materials filed yesterday with the...more
Three days after Delaware’s governor, Matt Meyer, signed into law controversial amendments to Delaware's General Corporation Law, another publicly traded company filed preliminary proxy materials with the Securities and...more
Yesterday's post concerned the Delaware Supreme Court's decision that the business judgment rule applied to TripAdvisor's decision to reincorporate in Nevada. Maffei v. Palkon, 2025 WL 384054 (Del. Feb. 4, 2025). This...more
Last week Kevin M. LaCroix reported that the Board of Directors of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation had voted unanimously to approve the staff’s request for authorization to file a suit against six former officers...more
A little more than eight years ago, I wrote about U.S. District Court Judge Ronald M. Whyte's ruling that a corporate board of directors lacks the capacity of being sued. Theta Chi Fraternity, Inc. v. Leland Stanford Junior...more
Professor Stephen Bainbridge has offered a rebuttal to my observation that Delaware's corporate law is inaccessible to everyday observers. He posits that inaccessibility is a "feature not a bug". As an example, he describes...more
Under California Penal Code Section 496(a) a person who buys or receives any property that has been stolen or that has been obtained in any manner constituting theft or extortion, knowing the property to be so stolen or...more
When a shareholder sues derivatively, the shareholder is seeking relief not for itself, but for the corporation. Therefore, it should be expected that the shareholder is not free to compromise or dismiss the suit absent...more
11/4/2024
/ Board of Directors ,
Breach of Duty ,
Corporate Governance ,
Corporate Misconduct ,
Corporate Officers ,
Derivative Suit ,
Fiduciary Duty ,
General Corporation Law ,
Nevada ,
Shareholder Litigation ,
Shareholders
In a recent post, Professor Stephen Bainbridge discusses the question of when a controlling shareholder owes fiduciary duties to minority shareholders. Knowing when controlling shareholder owes fiduciary duties is one thing,...more
Many corporations pay significant amounts for directors and officers liability policies. Commonly referred to as D&O policies, these policies usually involve three sides. Directors and officers are likely to have the most...more
Last year, Vice Chancellor J. Travis Laster famously held that officers could be subject to liability under the Caremark doctrine. In re McDonald’s Corp., 289 A.3d 343 (Del. Ch. Jan. 26, 2023). The Caremark doctrine...more
In Revlon, Inc. v. MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings, Inc., 506 A.2d 173, 182 (1986), the Delaware Supreme Court famously held that when the sale of a corporation becomes inevitable, the board of directors' duty changed from the...more
I always enjoy hearing from readers of this blog. Recently, I wrote:
Reading these statutes together, it is relatively clear that Nevada, like Delaware, permits the articles of incorporation to vary the mandate that...more
Nevada famously limits directors and officers from personal liability. However, it would be an overstatement to say that Nevada is a "liability free" jurisdiction. For example, the Nevada Supreme Court recently held that...more
5/31/2024
/ Acquisitions ,
Board of Directors ,
Breach of Duty ,
Corporate Governance ,
Corporate Officers ,
Fiduciary Duty ,
NV Supreme Court ,
Parent Corporation ,
Shareholder Litigation ,
Shareholders ,
Subsidiaries
A recent ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Anthony J. Battaglia addresses whether demand futility is an affirmative defense that must be asserted in an answer or raised in a motion to dismiss. In re Franklin Wireless, 2024...more