In a flurry of headline-grabbing events involving Bank of America last Thursday, the SEC announced the renewed settlement of its enforcement suit against the company, while at the same time New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced his office’s initiation of a separate fraud action against the company and two former company officials. These high-profile developments pose a series of questions, not the least of which are the questions concerning the claims raised — or not raised — against the company officials, which in turn underscore some basic issues concerning the liability of individuals under the federal securities laws.

 

The first and most fundamental question is whether Southern District of New York Jed Rakoff will approve the current $150 million settlement, after previously rejecting the prior $33 million deal.

 

In his harshly worded September 14, 2009 opinion (here), Judge Rakoff rejected the prior settlement, finding that it was "neither fair, nor reasonable, nor adequate." He challenged the very premise of the deal, which he said "proposes that shareholders who were the victims of the Bank’s alleged misconduct must now pay the penalty for the misconduct."

 

Judge Rakoff further criticized the deal because the SEC did not explain why "it did not pursue charges against the Bank management or the lawyers who allegedly were responsible for the false and misleading proxy statements."

 

As Susan Beck of the AmLaw Litigation Daily points out in her February 4, 2010 article about the settlement (here, registration required), the renewed settlement seemingly does not address either of Judge Rakoff’s principal concerns. That is, the company is still proposing to settle the case at the expense of current shareholders. And the settlement does not address Rakoff’s earlier criticism of the SEC for failing to hold any individuals accountable.

 

Along the same lines, the WSJ.com Law Blog quotes (here) Duke Law Professor James Cox as saying "Either I’m hopelessly ignorant or this doesn’t address Rakoff’s concerns at all. Maybe they think Rakoff is getting senile in his old age. But I wouldn’t count on that."

 

The lack of SEC action against individual company officials is all the more evident because of the separate action the NYAG initiated virtually simultaneously with the SEC’s announcement of the renewed settlement. Cuomo’s lawsuit (here) not only names the company, but also names as defendants former BofA CEO Ken Lewis and former CFO Joseph Price. The New York action seemingly begs the question of why the SEC did not pursue claims against individuals, especially in light of Rakoff’s concerns.

 

There are some important considerations that need to be taken into account in contrasting the SEC’s and the NYAG’s respective actions. First of all, the SEC has said all along that the reason it did not pursue enforcement claims against individuals is because of concerns with its ability to satisfy scienter requirements. Indeed, in his September 14 opinion, Judge Rakoff expressly noted that the SEC had contended at that time that it had not pursued claims against individuals as "culpable intent was lacking because the lawyers made all the relevant decisions."

 

Thought the NYAG’s action asserts claims against two former executives, the legal basis of the claim is New York’s Martin Act. Unlike the liability provisions of the federal securities laws, the Martin Act does not require a finding that the individuals acted intentionally. The NYAG’s claims simply do not face the same pleading barriers as the SEC would if it were to pursue claims under the federal securities laws against company executives.

 

The challenge in substantiating claims under the federal securities laws against senior company officials even when their company was engaged in fraudulent misconduct was underscored in the recent Vivendi securities class action trial, where the jury found the company liable on all 57 counts, yet at the same time found the individual defendants not liable. In a post trial interview (here), the individual defendants’ trial counsel explained that this seemingly split verdict can be understood in part by the fact that the jury (defense counsel contend) was persuaded by the individuals’ testimony that they had not intended to mislead anyone.

 

The SEC’s reluctance to pursue the BofA executives and the odd split verdict in the Vivendi trial raise some interesting questions to ponder about the susceptibility of individuals to the imposition of liability under the federal securities law, although the lack of traction against the individual executives in those two cases may simply be a reflection of situation specific circumstances.

 

But in any event, the seeming contradiction between the SEC’s inaction against any individuals and the NYAG’s pursuit of the two executives may not be quite as first appears. Among other things, the SEC settlement and the NYAG’s lawsuit announcement were not in isolation from each other. To the contrary, Cuomo’s press release expressly references the SEC’s settlement and quotes him as saying that he support the SEC’s settlement.

 

The suggestion is that the two developments should not be viewed as in disjunction but rather as complementary. Perhaps the SEC will refer to the NYAG’s suit in response to Rakoff’s likely concerns with the settlement about the SEC’s inaction against individuals.

 

The most important differences between the SEC’s renewed settlement and the earlier version Rakoff rejected are that the latest deal represents significantly larger dollar amounts, and it also includes the company’s agreement to adopt certain corporate governance reforms.

 

The governance reforms arguably provide real value to the current shareholders. But even if the value to shareholders is substantial, the renewed deal still does not avoid Judge Rakoff’s earlier concerns that BofA’s shareholders are being forced to bear the cost for having been misled about the Merrill Lynch transaction. Indeed, the significantly larger dollar value of the renewed settlement seemingly exacerbates this very problem.

 

Given these concerns, it will be very interesting to see what Judge Rakoff does with the renewed settlement. It is very hard to read his September 14 opinion now and to think that this renewed settlement will fare any better than the prior version. It will be particularly interesting to see what Judge Rakoff’s response says about the fundamental notion of holding individuals accountable under the federal securities laws.

 

Broc Romanek’s post about the SEC’s renewed settlement on his CorporateCounsel.net blog (here) has some interesting observations about the role of corporate governance reforms within the resolution of SEC enforcement actions.

 

"Bump-Up" Claims Surge: Much ink has been spilled concerning the supposed decline in the number of securities class action lawsuit filings in 2009. But whether or not the class suits are in fact declining, another form of corporate litigation apparently is on the rise.

 

According to a February 4, 2010 Law.com article (here), there has been an "uptick in shareholder lawsuits over mergers and acquisitions." One source quoted in the article states that filings of those types of claims – referred to as "bump up" actions because they seek to increase the sale price – are up "at least 50 percent" over a few years ago.

 

The article also quotes Boris Feldman of the Wilson Sonsini law firm as saying that "plaintiffs lawyers are trying to replenish their inventory, because traditional securities suits have fallen." He goes on to say that "nature abhors a vacuum, so more and more plaintiff firms have been filing merger suits instead."

 

Many D&O insurance policies have express exclusions precluding coverage for the amount of any additional consideration paid to settle a bump up claim. Moreover, as I discussed at length in a prior post (here), some courts have held that there is no coverage for the additional consideration, even without respect to the exclusion. In many circumstances, however, defense costs at least may be covered.

 

Lehman Subprime-Related ERISA Suit Dismissed: In an earlier post (here), I noted that Judge Lewis Kaplan had dismissed liability claims filed against the rating agencies that had provided ratings opinions in connection certain Lehman Brothers securities offerings. In a separate opinion relating to the Lehman collapse, on February 2, 2010 Judge Lewis Kaplan also dismissed the subprime-related ERISA class action that beneficiaries had filed against former company officials. A copy of Judge Kaplan’s opinion can be found here.

 

In dismissing the case, Judge Kaplan held that the complaint failed to allege that the misconduct alleged against the eleven director defendants violated any fiduciary duties that the individuals had to plan beneficiaries. He further held that the complaint failed to allege that the sole remaining defendant (a member of the plan administrative committee) had any responsibility for or involvement with the company’s supposedly misleading disclosures, or any prior awareness of the company’s imminent collapse.

 

A February 3, 2010 AmLaw article discussing the opinion can be found here (registration required). I have in any event added the opinion to my list of subprime-related lawsuit dismissal motion rulings, which can be accessed here.

 

Lost Generation: If you have not yet seen it, you may want to take a couple of minutes to view the Lost Generation "mirror image" video. It is pretty bare bones, but is still makes an interesting statement. Hat tip to the CorporateCounsel.net blog for the link.

 

https://youtube.com/watch?v=42E2fAWM6rA%26hl%3Den_US%26fs%3D1%26