Over the last several months, the boards of a number of tech companies have been hit with “follow on” shareholder derivative lawsuits, after the companies were first sued in underlying intellectual property suits. The derivative lawsuits allege that the companies’ boards knowingly allowed their companies to use copyrighted materials to train their AI models, resulting in the underlying IP liability litigation, as well as potential IP-related liability. In the following guest post, Nathaniel French and Mason Dressler take a detailed look at the latest of these lawsuits, filed against Apple’s board. Nate is a partner and Mason is an associate at the Kennedys law firm. Our thanks to Nate and Mason for allowing us to publish their article on this site.

Continue Reading Guest Post: Apple Intelligence: Ongoing Risks Associated with AI Development

On August 21, 2026, when the Tioga-Franklin Saving Bank of Philadelphia was closed by banking regulators, it became the fifth U.S. bank to fail this year. The five failures so far in 2026 comes after only two banks closed in 2024 and in 2025, respectively. News of the most recent closure left me wondering if perhaps there was something to worry about with the recent apparent uptick in bank failures. Turns out, I am not the only one wondering about this. On August 26, 2026, Law.com ran an article considering what might be causing the recent increase in the number of bank failures. While the Law.com article concludes that the banks closed this year mostly failed due to operating problems specific to the failed institutions involved, there is still enough there to take a closer look at what is going on.

Continue Reading Should We Worry About the Uptick in Bank Failures?

The D&O Diary has been closely following the growing number of lawsuits, investigations, and governance concerns emerging from the private credit sector. Private credit generally refers to loans made by non-bank lenders, which may include private funds or asset managers, to corporate borrowers. As private credit managers have become increasingly integrated with life insurers and affiliated businesses, questions surrounding related-party transactions and disclosure practices have attracted heightened scrutiny. The investigations involving Mark Walter and several entities within his business empire provide a particularly noteworthy example of how these concerns can evolve into significant regulatory and potential D&O liability events.

While public attention has focused on Walter’s ownership interests in major sports franchises, the underlying investigations reportedly involve questions surrounding affiliated private credit investments, related-party transactions, and disclosure practices involving insurer assets. The circumstances remain ongoing, and no wrongdoing has been alleged. Because the investigations and related proceedings remain ongoing and the relevant facts remain under development, the term “Walter matter” is used throughout this article as a neutral description of the situation.

As discussed below, the Walter matter offers an instructive case study of how questions involving affiliated transactions can develop into significant regulatory scrutiny and potential D&O liability exposures.

Continue Reading Private Credit, Affiliated Transactions, and D&O Risk

Every year after Labor Day, The D&O Diary takes a step back to survey the most important current trends and developments in the world of Directors’ and Officers’ liability and insurance. This year’s review is set out below. As the following discussion shows, this is a particularly interesting time in the world of D&O.

Continue Reading What to Watch in the World of D&O
Stephen Hourigan

In the following guest post, Stephen Hourigan argues that a key driver of D&O claim severity is not necessarily board ignorance or misconduct, but the delay between when warning signs are known somewhere within the organization and when they are effectively communicated to the board. Steve suggests that there are questions underwriters can ask to determine the effectiveness of information communication to corporate boards. Steve is the Founder and CEO of Heardsafe, LLC. Our thanks to Steve for allowing us to publish his article as a guest post on our site.

Continue Reading Guest Post: Governance Signal Decay as a D&O Severity Problem

In Episode 6 of the D&O Diary Podcast Series, we sit down with Dan Holloway, Head of Global Management Liability & Professional Indemnity at Allianz Commercial, to discuss the results of a recent global survey examining industry perspectives on AI and its impact on D&O liability and insurance.

The survey, conducted jointly by The D&O Diary and Allianz Commercial, gathered responses from 250 insurance professionals across the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, and 21 additional countries. Participants included insurers, brokers, and representatives of insured companies, providing a broad cross-section of views on the opportunities and risks presented by AI.

During our conversation, we discuss the survey’s key findings and what they reveal about market sentiment toward AI, including the growing consensus that AI presents both significant opportunities and meaningful governance challenges. We also examine how insurers are evaluating AI governance as part of the underwriting process, whether existing D&O insurance policy forms are adequate to address AI-related risks, and what AI may mean for the future direction of the D&O insurance marketplace.

While AI technology may be new, many of the risks associated with AI are fundamentally governance risks, making effective oversight, accountability, and risk management more important than ever.

🎧 Listen now on:

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-d-o-diary-podcast/id1896880954?i=1000787185496

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/55DTcVBLwoiaTmWfYjHgoB?si=_KwVCEhaSduswZVvPv1C8g
📺 Watch now on YouTube: https://youtu.be/OGbnKqwCYAY

If you enjoy the podcast, please consider following the series and sharing it with colleagues. We also welcome your suggestions for future topics.

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As we have noted on this site, the increasing number of AI-related corporate and securities lawsuit filings is one of the most important recent developments in the world of D&O liability and insurance. Among the AI lawsuits is a particular category of claims involving allegations against AI infrastructure companies. By way of example, last week, two AI infrastructure companies were hit with securities suits alleging that the companies overstated their business opportunities  arising from providing infrastructure to support the burgeoning AI  build-out. As discussed further below, these AI infrastructure lawsuits represent their own category of AI-related suit filings.

Continue Reading AI Infrastructure Companies Hit with Securities Suits     

Over the past year, market-manipulation lawsuits have become a growing feature of the securities litigation landscape, with plaintiffs targeting alleged spoofing, short-selling, pump-and-dump schemes, and other trading-related misconduct. The latest such case, filed on July 31, 2026, in the Middle District of Florida, names hedge fund Pentwater Capital Management and its founder, Matthew Halbower, as defendants (Pentwater SCA). The complaint alleges that they manipulated the market for Avis Budget Group (Avis) shares by orchestrating a short squeeze and then selling into the resulting price spike.

Unlike pump-and-dump securities suits premised on allegedly false or misleading statements, the Pentwater SCA is based on the defendants’ trading activity itself. The lawsuit arguably represents an example of a growing trend in market-manipulation-related securities class action litigation while underscoring an increasingly important issue for D&O underwriters: securities litigation risk arising not from disclosure deficiencies, but from market-structure and trading-related factors capable of driving extreme stock-price volatility.

A copy of the Pentwater SCA can be found here.

Continue Reading Short Squeeze Lawsuit Filed Against Pentwater Capital

The securities class action lawsuit filed against Intuit, Inc. on August 17, 2026, represents another notable development in one of the most significant securities litigation trends of the year. According to our count, the Intuit case is the 20th AI-related securities class action filed in 2026, underscoring the continued evolution of AI-related litigation beyond traditional allegations of AI-washing and overstated artificial intelligence capabilities.

Similar to the securities class action filed against ZoomInfo Technologies on July 13, 2026, the complaint against Intuit alleges that, while the company promoted the benefits of artificial intelligence, it failed to disclose the extent to which AI was simultaneously creating competitive pressures for key parts of its business.

A copy of the complaint filed against Intuit can be found here.

Continue Reading Intuit Hit with AI-Related Securities Suit
Nessim Mezrahi
Stephen Sigrist

In the following guest post, Nessim Mezrahi and Stephen Sigrist present their view that U.S. securities litigation risk is increasing significantly, driven by geopolitical instability and weakening investor confidence in the AI investment proposition, and that growing market capitalization losses, increased shareholder scrutiny, and the potential for an AI-related market correction are creating heightened securities litigation exposure. Nessim Mezrahi is co-founder and CEO, and Stephen Sigrist is a senior vice president, at SAR LLC. Our thanks to Nessim and Stephen for allowing us to publish their article on our site.

Continue Reading Guest Post:  Increasing Deterioration in U.S. Securities Litigation Risk