Navigating Disputes Within Your Health Care Practice
Williams Mullen Mezzanine Lending Video Series - Episode 4
Private Equity and Delaware Law – Part One
NGE On Demand: Profits Interests: Granting & Receiving with Patty Cain and Josh Klein
Episode 021: Member Liquidity, Default Rules, and the Corporate-ization of LLCs: A Conversation with Dean Donald J. Weidner
Episode 19: The LLC’s Two Worlds: A Conversation with Professor Peter Molk (Part One)
Lawyers on Tap: Tap Tips for Entity Formation and Taxation
Episode 014: Business Divorce Stories: Business Appraiser Tony Cotrupe and Attorney Jeff Eilender
Episode 4: John Cunningham Interview on Avoiding LLC Deadlock
Episode 6: Tom Rutledge Takes on LLC Member Expulsion
Homebuilder Series Webinar: Joint Ventures Solutions, Steve Lear
In addition to blooming trees and longer days, spring in New York has ushered in a fresh crop of noteworthy decisions on intra-LLC disputes. Headliners include a boost to members’ rights to compel an accounting courtesy of...more
In “business divorce” litigation involving LLCs, it is common to see a disgruntled LLC member asserting claims against the LLC’s manager. Depending on the type of harm alleged, those claims might be asserted directly (by the...more
“There is only going to be one winner here, and it’s not going to be you—give in while there is something still left in it for you,” said one LLC member to the other. With co-owners like that, who needs enemies?...more
There’s a ton of Delaware caselaw enforcing Section 18-1101 (c) of that state’s LLC Act as amended in 2004, authorizing LLC agreements to eliminate the members’ and managers’ liability for breach of fiduciary duty, the only...more
In my business divorce practice I deal with many closely held corporations that have only a few or perhaps just two shareholders, each of whom is actively involved in running the business. Within that category are many...more
Some years are easier than others to select the most significant business divorce cases. In this, the 16th year I’ve published this top-10 list, the task is made especially difficult by a veritable flood of court decisions...more
One of the earliest signs that a closely-held business is headed for divorce lies in how its owners treat new opportunities. When the relationship among the owners reaches a certain level of distrust, an owner presented with...more
Nestled between Broadway and Church Street in New York City’s hottest neighborhood is the landmarked, stone-façade building at 66-68 Reade Street. Now marketed as the superluxury boutique condominium complex 66 Reade, the...more
You know you’re in big trouble if the post-trial decision in a lawsuit you filed begins like this: “The court finds the plaintiff, Rowen Seibel, not credible. This is primarily because it appears he fabricated evidence...more
I can’t say what the number is, but my own experience tells me that a significant percentage of lawsuits by a minority owner of a closely-held company against those in control of the company include a demand for an...more
One of the goals in a business divorce is finality – ending a business relationship once and for all. But what if the end isn’t really the end?...more
In Villareal v. Saenz, a district court magistrate judge for the Western District of Texas, San Antonio Division, has recognized that members exiting a limited liability company may continue to hold fiduciary duties despite...more
Managing members of manager-managed New York LLCs owe default fiduciary duties of loyalty and care to non-managing members. Those duties can be modified by the operating agreement....more
In Villareal v. Saenz, two co-owners of a limited liability company sued each other regarding conduct surrounding a business divorce. 5-20-CV-00571-OLG-RBF, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 94183 (W.D. Tex. May 18, 2021)....more
Last week, Peter Mahler blogged about a recent decision holding that a minority shareholder’s claim against its majority co-owners for breach of fiduciary duty in connection with a sale of the business to a third party...more
Of late I’ve been ruminating on New York’s membership in the shrinking pool of states that don’t recognize oppression of an LLC minority member by the controlling members or managers as ground for judicial dissolution....more
Oral agreements to form and operate business enterprises are a recurring subject of this blog. We’ve written many times, for example, about the comparative ease vis-a-vis other kinds of entities with which one can...more
In 2011 and 2012, the New York Court of Appeals decided a series of difficult cases addressing the circumstances under which a contractual waiver or release included in a buyout or other agreement between co-owners of closely...more
The restaurant business is on the skids amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Yelp reports that 60% of closed restaurants won’t re-open. Apart from the pandemic, the success rate for new restaurants is dauntingly low. Surveys show a...more
The ongoing coronavirus / COVID-19 pandemic has quite literally impacted everyone and everything in New York, including the courts, which were forced to temporarily cease non-essential functions. The result was a short-lived...more
If you read most any operating agreement for a manager-managed LLC, chances are you’ll find somewhere in it a grant of decision-making authority in the manager’s “sole and absolute discretion” or verbiage to similar effect....more
In the end, it wasn’t much of a fight. The case of Huggins v Scott, decided last month by Justice W. Franc Perry of the Manhattan Supreme Court, illustrates anew the well-nigh insurmountable hurdle faced by a minority...more
Consider the following hypothetical: The operating agreement of an LLC vests management authority in its two members. ...more
Over the last several years, the books-and-records proceeding and its corresponding shareholder rights of inspection seem to have entered a bit of renaissance period in the courts. ...more