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Securities
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October 16, 2024
Atty Pressed On DMI Stock Drop Focus In Del. Merger Suit
A Delaware vice chancellor repeatedly pressed an attorney for shareholders of 3D printer manufacturer The ExOne Co. Wednesday on the relative importance of a stock drop experienced by acquirer Desktop Metal Inc. before and after shareholders voted on a $575 million merger.
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October 16, 2024
Banks Ditch Exchange's Boycott Conspiracy Suit At 2nd Circ.
The Second Circuit on Wednesday rejected a small trading exchange's effort to revive its claims that several major banks conspired to shut it out of the credit default swap market, saying the exchange failed to plausibly allege that the banks' conduct was the result of an unlawful agreement or conspiracy.
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October 16, 2024
Hawaii Utility Beats Investor Suit Over Wildfire, For Now
A California judge on Tuesday dismissed a shareholder suit filed against Hawaiian Electric Industries Inc. in the wake of a deadly fire on Maui in 2023, but will allow plaintiffs to amend their claims that the company failed to warn investors about its inadequate risk mitigation program.
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October 16, 2024
Pharma Co. Contractor Settles SEC Insider Trading Claim
An information technology consultant for a Massachusetts biopharmaceutical company will pay the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over $28,000 to resolve claims he immediately dumped shares of his client when he got wind of its yet-to-be announced plans for major layoffs.
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October 16, 2024
Ex-Pharma Co. Employee Traded On GSK Deal Info, SEC Says
The former director of analytical development at Canada-based drug company Bellus Health Inc. has agreed to pay the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over $120,000 to settle claims that he sold shares on nonpublic information about pharma giant GSK's impending takeover of his company, according to court filings.
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October 16, 2024
SEC To Settle Claims CBD Exec Took $13M From Hospital
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is ready to make a deal with a former cannabidiol products executive accused of taking $13 million from a hospital after falsely promising to deliver urgently needed masks during the height of the pandemic.
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October 16, 2024
Alphatec Investor Seeks $9.5M Atty Fee After Chancery Win
A family office investment company that recently won a five-year battle over millions worth of securities purchase rights not honored by a surgical and medical device developer asked Delaware's Court of Chancery on Wednesday to shift more than $9.5 million in fees and expenses to the developer.
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October 16, 2024
NYSE Seeks To Curb Reverse Splits In Latest Crackdown
The New York Stock Exchange wants to limit companies' ability to rely on reverse stock splits to raise their share prices and avoid delisting, submitting a proposal shortly after regulators approved a Nasdaq plan to rein in such splits.
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October 16, 2024
SEC Data Contractor Faked Audit Certification, Feds Say
The CEO of a company that received roughly $11 million from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to provide data infrastructure services was charged in D.C. federal court with creating a shell entity to fraudulently claim his business was certified for high-level reliability and security, prosecutors announced Wednesday.
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October 16, 2024
PE Firm Trashed Exec To Avoid Payout In $98M Deal, Suit Says
A Summit Partners affiliate and several executives concocted false allegations of misconduct to get out of fully compensating the owner of an investment management firm as part of an acquisition worth a reported $97.6 million, according to a complaint filed in Massachusetts state court.
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October 16, 2024
2 SDNY Terror Finance Cases Against Binance Stay Separate
Two suits claiming Binance unlawfully fostered terrorist activity, filed in the wake of the cryptocurrency platform's $4.3 billion settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice, will proceed separately in the Southern District of New York, a Manhattan federal judge said Wednesday.
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October 16, 2024
RTX To Pay $1B For Qatari Bribes And Defrauding US Gov't
RTX Corp. and its Raytheon subsidiary have agreed to pay approximately $1 billion and enter into two separate deferred prosecution agreements in connection with a bribery scheme to secure Qatari military contracts, as well as separate ploys to defraud the U.S. government in deals for Patriot missile and radar systems.
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October 16, 2024
US Fails To Revoke Bail Of Crypto Chief Wanted In Fraud Case
The U.S. government failed on Wednesday to keep the former chief executive of a $7.5 billion crypto-asset business in custody while he fights extradition for allegedly manipulating the market for his company's virtual tokens, as a judge deemed him a low flight risk.
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October 15, 2024
Conn. Trader Pilfered $4.1M From Struggling Firm, SEC Says
A Greenwich, Conn.-based investment adviser stole more than $4.1 million from a pair of investment funds he managed to help prop up his family's "expensive lifestyle" and counter his personal financial woes, including several tax liens and foreclosure attempts on his home, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has alleged.
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October 15, 2024
Santander Settles Investors' Squeeze-Out Suit For $162.5M
Santander Consumer USA Holdings Inc. has agreed to shell out $162.5 million to put to rest stockholders' consolidated class action challenging a $2.5 billion minority squeeze-out merger, according to a stipulation filed Monday in Delaware's Court of Chancery.
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October 15, 2024
Exec's $77M WeWork Offer Was Stupid, Not Fraud, Jury Told
Counsel for the former CEO of real estate investment firm Arciterra told a Manhattan federal jury Tuesday his client was a fool for making what prosecutors described as a fake $77 million tender offer for a controlling stake in WeWork before its bankruptcy, but he wasn't trying to falsely pump up the coworking company's stock price.
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October 15, 2024
Crypto Huckster Slammed With 20 Years For Forcount Fraud
A New York federal judge on Tuesday sentenced an Ecuadorean man from Florida to 20 years in prison for pushing the $14 million, international Forcount cryptocurrency Ponzi scheme on his fellow Latinos over five years, saying he caused incalculable damage.
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October 15, 2024
10th Circ. Won't Reboot Short Sellers' Suit Against Overstock
In a decision dealing with matters of first impression, the Tenth Circuit on Tuesday declined to revive a hedge fund's proposed class action accusing Overstock.com Inc. and its leadership of manipulating the market when it said it would pay shareholders using cryptocurrency but abandoned the plan to force short sellers into a "squeeze."
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October 15, 2024
SafeMoon Execs Can't Beat Fraud Charges Now, Feds Say
The crypto executives behind the alleged SafeMoon fraud can't claim their conduct was beyond the reach of U.S. courts at this stage of litigation, federal prosecutors said in a brief that pushed back on the executives' bid to dismiss the indictment.
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October 15, 2024
SEC Says Robot Co.'s AI Caretaker Was Mostly A Dummy
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued a robotics and artificial intelligence startup and its founder in Florida federal court Tuesday, accusing them of misleading investors about the company's ability to develop an AI-infused hologram and a robot to help families with childcare and other tasks.
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October 15, 2024
Kirkland-Led Boeing Seeks Up To $35B Amid Labor Strike
Boeing notified regulators on Tuesday of plans to raise up to $35 billion through securities offerings and a credit agreement, guided by Kirkland & Ellis LLP, as the aviation giant seeks access to cash amid a prolonged strike and production cuts.
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October 15, 2024
Hedge Fund Urges Justices To Hear Swing-Trade Case
The U.S. Supreme Court has been asked by a hedge fund facing insider trading allegations to address "significant and recurring issues" that allowed a 1-800-Flowers.com shareholder to proceed with his derivative lawsuit despite failing to prove that the company was harmed in any way by the fund's short-swing trades.
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October 15, 2024
Chancery Urged To Toss Smart & Final $1.1B Sale Challenge
An attorney for funds of Ares Alternative Management Corp. told Delaware's chancellor on Tuesday a stockholder suit alleging breaches of fiduciary duty and corporate waste in a $1.1 billion sale of Smart & Final Stores Inc. failed to show disabling conflicts among company principals or advisers.
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October 15, 2024
No 'Third Bite' For Ex-Lender's FDIC Suit, Judge Rules
A D.C. federal judge has tossed a lawsuit from a former small business financier contesting the constitutionality of a Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. enforcement action against him, saying the plaintiff has already twice litigated and lost the case in Rhode Island.
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October 15, 2024
Morgan Stanley, BofA Sued Over Cash Sweep Programs
Minnesota-based financial services company Safron Capital Corp. launched a pair of proposed class actions against Morgan Stanley and Bank of America in New York alleging the firms used their so-called cash sweep programs "to generate massive revenue for themselves at the expense of their customers."
Expert Analysis
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How Justices Upended The Administrative Procedure Act
In its recent Loper Bright, Corner Post and Jarkesy decisions, the U.S. Supreme Court fundamentally changed the Administrative Procedure Act in ways that undermine Congress and the executive branch, shift power to the judiciary, curtail public and business input, and create great uncertainty, say Alene Taber and Beth Hummer at Hanson Bridgett.
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How Corner Post Affects Enviro Laws' Statutes Of Limitations
The U.S. Supreme Court's recent ruling in Corner Post v. Federal Reserve Board has helped to alter the fundamental underpinnings of administrative law — and its plaintiff-centric approach may have implications for some specific environmental laws' statutes of limitations, say Chris Leason and Liam Martin at Gallagher and Kennedy.
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FTC Drives Crackdown On Connected Cars' Data Privacy Risk
After the Federal Trade Commission's warning to automakers about data privacy, which continues to emerge as a national concern, automakers must carefully examine their data collection, use and retention practices, say Catherine Castaldo and Michael Rubayo at Reed Smith.
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Jarkesy May Thwart Consumer Agencies' Civil Penalty Power
The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission v. Jarkesy not only implicates future SEC administrative adjudications, but those of other agencies that operate similarly — and may stymie regulators' efforts to levy civil monetary penalties in a range of consumer protection enforcement actions, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.
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Lessons From Recent SEC Cyber Enforcement Actions
The recent guidance by the SEC's Division of Corporation Finance is helpful to any company facing a cybersecurity threat, but just as instructive are the warnings raised by the SEC's recent enforcement actions against SolarWinds, R.R. Donnelley and Intercontinental Exchange, say attorneys at O'Melveny.
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Opinion
Texas Judges Ignored ERISA's Core To Stall Fiduciary Rule
Two recent rulings from Texas federal courts, which rely on a plainly wrong reading of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act to effectively strike a forthcoming rule that would impose functional fiduciary duties onto sellers of investment services, may expose financially unsophisticated 401(k) participants to peddlers of misleading advice, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.
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2nd Circ. Ruling Reaffirms Short-Swing Claims Have Standing
The Second Circuit's recent ruling in Packer v. Raging Capital reversing the dismissal of a shareholder's Section 16(b) derivative suit seeking to recover short-swing profits for lack of constitutional standing settles the uncertainty of the district court's decision, which could have undercut Congress' intent in crafting Section 16(b) in the first place, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.
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Inside OCC's Retail Nondeposit Investment Products Refresh
In addition to clarifying safe and sound risk management practices generally, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's revised booklet on retail nondeposit investment products updates its guidance around certain sales practices in light of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's adoption of Regulation Best Interest, say attorneys at Debevoise.
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Mirror, Mirror On The Wall, Is My Counterclaim Bound To Fall?
A Pennsylvania federal court’s recent dismissal of the defendants’ counterclaims in Morgan v. Noss should remind attorneys to avoid the temptation to repackage a claim’s facts and law into a mirror-image counterclaim, as this approach will often result in a waste of time and resources, says Matthew Selmasska at Kaufman Dolowich.
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Why The SEC Is Targeting Short-And-Distort Schemes
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's recent crackdown on the illegal practice of short-and-distort trades highlights the urgent need for public companies to adopt proactive measures, including pursuing private rights of action, say attorneys at Baker McKenzie.
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Series
Playing Dungeons & Dragons Makes Me A Better Lawyer
Playing Dungeons & Dragons – a tabletop role-playing game – helped pave the way for my legal career by providing me with foundational skills such as persuasion and team building, says Derrick Carman at Robins Kaplan.
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A Look At The Regulatory Scrutiny Facing Liquid Restaking
Recent U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement actions highlight the regulatory challenges facing emerging financial instruments like liquid restaking tokens and services, say Daniel Davis and Alexander Kim at Katten.
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Del. Dispatch: Director Caremark Claims Need Extreme Facts
The Delaware Court of Chancery recently dismissed Caremark claims against the directors of Centene in Bricklayers Pension Fund of Western Pennsylvania v. Brinkley, indicating a high bar for a finding of the required element of bad faith for Caremark liability, and stressing the need to resist hindsight bias, say attorneys at Fried Frank.
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5 Insights Into FDIC's Final Rule On Big-Bank Resolution Plans
Although the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s recently finalized rule expanding resolution planning requirements for large banks was generally adopted as proposed, it includes key changes related to filing deadlines, review and feedback, and incorporates lessons learned — particularly from last year's bank failures, say attorneys at Cleary.
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Jarkesy Ruling May Redefine Jury Role In Patent Fraud
Regardless of whether the U.S. Supreme Court’s Jarkesy ruling implicates the direction of inequitable conduct, which requires showing that the patentee made material statements or omissions to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the decision has created opportunities for defendants to argue more substantively for jury trials than ever before, say attorneys at Cadwalader.