Podcast: Discussing and Demystifying the IRS News Release on ESOPs
(A)ESOP's Fables - The Income and Estate Tax-Free ESOP
Investment Management Update – Exit Strategies
ESOPs: A Path to Bank Independence
As previously discussed, courts continue to disagree over the enforceability of mandatory arbitration provisions containing class action waivers set forth in benefit plans governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security...more
A federal district court judge in the Eastern District of Kentucky has enforced an ESOP’s arbitration clause, sending P.L. Marketing Inc. employees’ breach of fiduciary duty claims on behalf of a putative class to individual...more
The Third Circuit refused to enforce a mandatory arbitration clause with a class action waiver in an ESOP, finding that the class action waiver deprived participants of statutory rights. The ESOP plan added the clause at...more
On February 9, 2023, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit refused to enforce an arbitration clause contained in an employee stock ownership plan (“ESOP”) document. In a 41-page opinion, the Court held that the ESOP...more
While case law regarding the enforceability of arbitration provisions in ERISA retirement plans has been mixed, since the Ninth Circuit’s 2019 decision in Dorman v. Charles Schwab Corp. enforcing a 401(k) plan’s arbitration...more
Historically, courts around the country have approached the enforceability of class action waivers and arbitration provisions in ESOP and Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) plan documents differently,...more
Over the past few years, qualified retirement plans, including employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) have been adding provisions requiring participant breach of fiduciary duty claims to be resolved through mandatory...more
• Some retirement plans, including employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs), have in the past few years included terms and provisions that require participant breach of fiduciary claims to be resolved in arbitration on a...more
• The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio has ruled that the arbitration provision of an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) does not apply to the plaintiff's class representative because she had "cashed...more