Corporate and securities litigation filing activity reached a “crescendo” in the first quarter of 2011, according to the most recent quarterly report from Advisen, the insurance information firm. The filing rate in the year’s first three months if annualized would represent a record –settling annual level of corporate and securities litigation activity. A copy of the Advisen report can be found here. My own survey of the first quarter 2011 securities class action lawsuits filings can be found here.

 

Preliminary Notes

In considering the Advisen report, it is critically important to recognize that the report uses its own unique vocabulary to describe certain of the litigation categories.

 

The “securities” litigation analyzed in the Advisen report includes not only securities class action litigation, but a broad collection of other types of suits as well, including regulatory and enforcement actions, individual actions, derivative actions, collective actions filed outside the U.S. and allegations of breach of fiduciary duty. All of these various kinds of lawsuits, whether or not involving alleged violations of the securities laws, are referred to in the aggregate in the Advisen report as "securities suits."

 

One subset of the overall collection of "securities suits" is a category denominated as "securities fraud" lawsuits, which includes a combination of both regulatory and enforcement actions, on the one hand, and private securities lawsuits brought as individual actions, on the other hand. However, the category of "securities fraud" lawsuits does NOT include private securities class action lawsuits, which are in their own separate category ("SCAS").

 

Due to these unfamiliar usages and the confusing similarity of category names, considerable care is required in reading the report.

 

The Report’s Findings

According to the report there were a total of 363 corporate and securities lawsuits filed in the first quarter of 2011, which is up from the 342 filed in the fourth quarter of 2010 but below the quarterly record level of 386 set in the third quarter 2010. If the first quarter filing levels were to continue for the rest of the year, that would imply a 2011 year-end total of 1,448 corporate and securities lawsuits, which, according to Advisen would represent a “record-setting year.” Just to put this level of filing activity into perspective, prior to the credit crisis “new filings averaged less than two-thirds of this annualized level.”

 

According to Advisen’s tally, there were 61 securities class action lawsuits in the first quarter of 2011. However, securities class action lawsuits as a percentage of all corporate and securities lawsuit filings continue to decline. As recently as 2006, corporate and securities lawsuits represented as much as one third of all corporate and securities litigation, but in the first quarter of 2011, the securities class action suits represented only 17 percent of all corporate and securities lawsuit filings.

 

With respect to the securities class action lawsuit filings, 85 percent of the suits were filed against companies in just five sectors: financial, information technology, consumer discretionary, energy and industrial. With respect to all corporate and securities litigation generally, financial firms continue to be the most frequently sued albeit at a lower level in recent years. Financial firms were named as defendant in 34 percent of all corporate and securities lawsuits in the first quarter, compared to 45 percent in 2008 and 40 percent in 2009.

 

Breach of fiduciary duty suits, many of which are filed in state court and many of which are filed shortly after the announcement of a proposed merger or acquisition, represent a growing area of corporate and securities litigation. These breach of fiduciary duty suits represent about a third of all corporate and securities lawsuit filings in the first quarter of 2011, up from only eight percent of all corporate and securities filings as recently as 2004. Over 60 percent of the first quarter breach of fiduciary duty suits were filed in the state court.

 

Corporate and securities litigation activity outside the U.S. has also been on the increase. During the first quarter of 2011, Advisen recorded 17 of the corporate and securities lawsuits filed outside of the United States.

 

By the same token, 16 percent of all corporate and securities lawsuits filed during the first quarter involved non-US companies, compared to only 11 percent in 2009 and 2010. These figures were largely driven by cases involving Chinese companies whose shares trade on the U.S. exchanges. Cases against Chinese companies in U.S. courts “mushroomed” in 2010, and continued in the first quarter, when there were 11 new securities lawsuits in the U.S. against Chinese companies. (This trend of filings against Chinese companies has continued into the second quarter as well, as I noted in my recent posts, here and here.)

 

Finally, with respect to settlements, the Advisen report notes that the average securities class action lawsuit settlement announced during the first quarter of 2011 was $54.6.

 

Quarterly Advisen Conference Call: On Thursday, April 21, 2011, I will be participating in an Advisen conference call to discuss the first quarter 2011 filing statistics and trends. The free one-hour conference call will take place at 11 am EDT. The conference call panel will include a number of distinguished speakers, including Dan Bailey from the Bailey Cavalieri law firm, Carol Zacharias from ACE, Carolyn Polikoff from the Woodruff Sawyer firm and David Bradford from Advisen. Information about the session including registration information can be found here.

 

For several years, Friday has been the day when the latest bank closures are announced (about which see further below). More recently, Friday also seems to be the day when the latest securities class actions involving Chinese companies are announced. This past Friday alone, three more securities suits involving Chinese companies were announced. Signs are that there are more to come. A brief description of the three latest cases follows.

 

Puda Coal: The first of the three latest Chinese suits involves Puda Coal, Inc., an NYSE company that is a Delaware corporation but which has its headquarters in Shanxi Province in China. There have actually been two separate lawsuits filed against Puda, one in the Southern District of New York (refer to the complaint here), and one in the Central District of California (here).

 

As reflected in plaintiffs’ counsel’s press release (here), the allegation is that Puda’s assets were transferred to a subsidiary of which Puda’s Chairman of the Board obtained control through a series of transactions, enabling the Chairman to profit personally from the sale of a minority interest in the subsidiary to a private equity firm. Following an internet website’s disclosures of the transactions, the company’s share price declined. In an April 11, 2011 press release (here), the company announced that its board had adopted the recommendation of the company’s audit committee to investigate the Chairman’s “unauthorized” transactions involving the subsidiary.

 

Subaye, Inc.: According to their April 15, 2011 press release (here), plaintiffs’ lawyers have initiated a securities class action lawsuit in the Southern District of New York against Subaye, Inc. and certain of its directors and officers. Subaye is a Delaware Corporation with its headquarters in Guangdong, China.

 

According to the press release, the complaint (which can be found here) was filed in the wake of the company’s April 7, 2011 announcement that its auditor PricewaterhouseCoopers Hong Kong had withdrawn and that prior to its resignation the audit firm had identified matters that might affect the fairness of the company’s previously issued financial statements. The press release states that

 

PwC’s was unable to obtain information and supporting documentation to verify: (a) cash settlements from sales agents to Subaye, (b) the end customer subscriptions for the Company’s services and the services rendered to the end customers, (c) marketing and promotion activities performed by sales agents in return for fees paid to such agents and recorded as expenses of the Company. PwC also stated that Subaye provided insufficient explanations regarding commonalities between certain customers and vendors. Lastly, PwC could find no evidence of any business tax payments by the Company for services rendered in China.

 

Universal Travel Group: According to their April 15, 2011 press release (here), plaintiffs’ lawyers have filed a securities class action lawsuit in the District of New Jersey against Universal Travel Group and certain of its directors and officers. Universal Travel is a Nevada corporation based in Shenzen, China.

 

The Universal Travel group lawsuit follows a March 2011 securities analyst’s report raising questions about the company’s business, its reported cash balances and revenues, and its relationship with an online travel service. The report stated that there were large differences between the revenues that a newly acquired subsidiary had reported to Chinese authorities and the revenues that Universal Travel reported.

 

 In an April 14, 2011 press release (here), the Company announced that it had hired a new auditor after its prior auditor resigned because “it was no longer able to complete the audit process” due to “the Company’s management and/or the Audit Committee being non-responsive, unwilling or reluctant to proceed in good faith and imposing scope limitations on [the auditor’s] audit procedures.”

 

These three new securities class action lawsuits follow closely on the heels of the four accounting-related  lawsuits involving Chinese companies filed earlier this month, as I noted in a prior blog post (here). With these three  latest lawsuits, there have now been a total of 14 securities class action lawsuits filed against Chinese and China-liked companies in 2011, out of a total of about 61 securities lawsuits that have filed so far this year, meaning that the suits against Chinese companies represent about 23% of all securities lawsuits filed so far this year. Ten of these have been filed just in the last 30 days.

 

The signs are that this recent outburst  of new lawsuit filings involving Chinese companies will likely continue. Plaintiffs’ law firms continue to publish press releases that they are “investigating” still other Chinese companies (refer for example, here and here) For that matter, the cascade of news raising questions about accounting practices involving some Chinese companies shows no signs of abating.

 

As Walter Pavlo notes on his White-Collar Crime blog on Forbes.com (here), many of the Chinese  companies involved in this rash of lawsuits obtained their U.S. listings through reverse mergers with a publicly traded U.S. shell company. In a later post (here), he also noted that many of these firms have the same auditors and used the same investment bank in their reverse merger transaction.

 

In an April 4, 2011 speech (here), SEC Commissioner Luis Aguilar noted that the problems arising involving Chinese companies that have obtained U.S. listing are a serious concern and that the SEC in cooperation with other organizations including the PCAOB is investigating the concerns that have arisen. Among other things, he noted that “a growing number” of these companies “are proving to have significant accounting deficiencies or being vessels of outright fraud.”

 

According to Commission Aguilar, since January 2007 over 150 Chinese companies have obtained U.S. listings using what he characterized as “backdoor registrations.” While not all of these companies are engaged in the kinds of activities described in the case summaries above, there definitely seems to be a pattern of involvement in conflicts of interest or accounting issues. The rash of recent resignations of the outside auditors from these companies suggests that the audit firms have had their consciences   raised about the dangers of becoming associated with these kinds of firms and accounting issues they may be having.

 

In any event, it seems likely that there will be further lawsuits involving these Chinese companies. David Bario’s April 4, 2011 Am Law Litigation Daily article profiling the plaintiffs’ lawyer behind many of these lawsuits can be found here.

 

Bank Failures Not Over Yet: Speaking of bank failures (as I was at the outset of this post), it now appears that my recent prediction that the bank failure wave may finally be over might have been premature. This past Friday night, the FDIC closed six more banks, bringing the year to date total number of bank closures to 34. While that is fewer than the 49 banks that had been closed at this point last year, the closure of six banks at one time does cut against the suggestion that the FDIC is winding down its bank closure activities.

 

With the addition of the latest six bank closures, the total number of banks that have failed since January 1, 2008 stands at 356. Of this total, 51 involve banks located in Georgia (including two of the six banks closed this past Friday night). After a while you do start to wonder if there how there could be any banks left in Georgia.

 

As I have noted elsewhere, the FDIC has still only brought a total of six lawsuits involving former directors and officers of the bank. However, on April 13, 2011, the FDIC did update the Professional Liability Lawsuits page on its website, to indicate the number of persons against who lawsuits have been authorized has been increased by 187 (up from the prior month’s total of 158). However, the six lawsuits filed to date involved only 42 individual defendants, which suggests that there are quite a number of lawsuit in the pipeline and yet to be filed. The updated page also notes that the FDIC has also authorized “11 fidelity bond, attorney malpractice, and appraiser malpractice lawsuits.”

 

Special thanks to the loyal readers who alerted me to the most recent bank closures and to the recent update to the FDIC website.

 

105 Years Ago Today: A rare 35 mm film of San Francisco just four days before the April 18, 1906 earthquake has been “found.” The person that send me a YouTube link to the file reports that “This film was originally thought to be from 1905 until David Kiehn with the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum figured out exactly when it was shot –from New York trade papers announcing the film showing, to the wet streets from recent heavy rainfall & shadows indicating time of year & actual weather and conditions on historical record, even when the cars were registered (he even knows who owned them and when the plates were issued!).”

 

The film, which was shot by mounting a camera on the front end of a cable car, is simply amazing. The clock tower at the end of Market Street at the Embarcadero wharf is still there. The number of automobiles on the road in 1906 is staggering. The absolute chaotic traffic suggests that rules of the road were a later invention.

 

There is an element of sadness too in the film, as so much of the city was destroyed days later and as many as 3000 people died in the quake and in the fire that followed. The film is a remarkable piece of history. Special thanks to the loyal reader who sent me the link.

 

https://youtube.com/watch?v=NINOxRxze9k

A number of trends that had predominated in recent years diminished during 2010 while new trends emerged, according to PwC’s 2010 Securities Litigation Study, which can be found here. 2010 may also mark “the start of a new era” as a consequences of a new regulatory and enforcement environment take effect, which “could lead to a reinvigorated volume of reported securities violations and associated class actions.” PwC’s April 7, 2011 press release about its report can be found here.

 

In many ways the 2010 securities litigation filing activity was characterized by the  reversal of a number of trends. Thus, for example, the declining numbers of credit crisis related cases meant that fewer cases were filed against financially related companies than in the immediately preceding three years (although financial companies remained the most frequent litigation target in 2010). In addition, accounting-related cases continued to decline in 2010, as did the number of new cases against Fortune 500 companies.

 

On the other hand, the reversal of these trends was “offset” by other trends that emerged during the year, leading to an overall jump in the number of cases. The focus of activity shifted from an “overwhelming focus on the financial services industry” to a “medley of issues across a variety of industries.”  Increasing numbers of cases against companies in the health industry, a surge in M&A related cases, a jump in cases against Chinese companies and a rash of cases against for-profit education companies all contributed to the increased litigation activity.

 

Overall, the total number of federal securities class action filings rose 12 percent during 2010 compared to 2009, from 155 to 174. (PwC’s count may vary from other published reports as a result of its counting methodology, pursuant to which “multiple filings against the same defendant with similar allegations are counted as one case.”). There were more filings in the third and fourth quarters of 2010 than in either of the first two quarters. Among other things, the increase in filings in the year’s second half reflected the “increasing domination o f non-financial crisis-related cases and the decline in financial-crisis related cases.”

 

Among the principle drivers of the increased number of filing in the second half of 2010 was the increase in the number of M&A related cases. Overall, M&A cases represented 24 percent of all securities filings in 2010, compared to only 4 percent in 2009.

 

Health industry cases increased from 17 percent in 2009 to 21 percent in 2010, representing the second highest percentage of for any industry in 2010. The filings included cases against pharmaceutical, medical device and health services companies. (My recent post discussing 2010 securities filings against life sciences companies can be found here.)

 

The percentage of cases raising accounting-related allegations (including overstatement of revenues, understatement of expenses and liabilities and overstatement of assets) fell from 37 percent in 2009 to 35 percent in 2010, which represents the lowest level of accounting-related cases in 15 years. The report speculates that one possible reason for this decline in accounting-related cases could be “the effectiveness of SOX in combating accounting fraud.” On the other hand, the decline in the number of cases involving accounting allegations could also just be a reflection of the changing mix of cases; the options backdating cases that predominated a few years ago were replete with accounting-related issues, but the increasing numbers of M&A cases in 2010 rarely involved accounting allegations.

 

Surprisingly, in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2010 decision in Morrison v. National Australia Bank, the number of filings involving foreign issuers increased during 2010 by 35 percent, and of the 27 cases filed in 2010 involving foreign issuers, 16 (or 59 percent) were filed after the Morrison decision was announced. The percentage of cases involving foreign issuers as a percentage of all filings increased during 2010 from 13 percent in 2009 to 16 percent in 2010.

 

Of these 27 cases involving foreign issuers, 12 cases (44 percent) involved Chinese companies. Eleven of the 12 cases against Chinese companies involved accounting allegations.

 

The average settlement of securities related cases during 2010 decreased by 11 percent compared to 2009, from $34 million to $30.1 million.(PwC ‘s figures may differ from other published reports as PwC assigns the settlement to the year of the “primary settlement announcement,” and any subsequent announcements are attributed to the primary announcement year.” PwC also excludes zero dollar settlements.)

 

 However, the average settlement value of cases settled for more than $1 million and less than $50 million increased by 21 percent, from $10.7 million in 2009 to $12.9 million. In addition, median settlements increased by nearly 35 percent, from $7.5 million to $10.1 million.

 

The PwC report concludes with a survey of the changing liability  environment arising from  the new regulatory mandates introduced by the Dodd-Frank Act. Because enforcement activities “are likely to increase” and the new Dodd-Frank whistleblower provisions “could produce a surge in allegations of securities violations,” the financial regulatory environment is “vastly different in 2011 from what it was just one year ago, and companies will have to devote significant resources to understanding and adapting to its new topography.”  The decade ahead has “the potential to yield yet more transformations.”

 

My analysis of the 2010 securities class action litigation filing can be found here. My more recent study of first quarter 2011 filings (here) shows that many of the trends that emerged in 2010 continued in the first quarter, including in particular the heightened level of M&A related litigation. In addition, as I recently noted (here), the wave of accounting-related litigation involving Chinese and China-linked companies has also continued in 2011.

 

WaMu Subprime-Related Securities Lawsuit Settlement in the Works: In case you missed the news last week, the WaMu subprime-related securities lawsuit apparently has settled. According to the Court’s  April 6, 2011 minute order (here), the parties have advised the court that the lead case has settled, and the Court has suspended all of the schedules dates and motions. The settlement papers have not yet been filed so the details of the settlement are not yet known, but an April 6, 2011 Seattle Times article by Sanjay Bhatt (here) reports that the amount of the settlement “is in excess of $200 million.”

 

The WaMu case, of course, relates to the facts and circumstances surrounding the largest bank failure in U.S. history. The case itself did not necessarily unfold smoothly from the plaintiffs’ perspective. In a May 2009 opinion that was sharply critical of the plaintiffs’ pleadings (about which refer here) , Western District of Washington Judge Marsha Pechman has initially granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss. However, the plaintiffs’ amended pleadings survived the renewed motion, and now the parties apparently have settled the case.

 

The details of the settlement, once they are finally released, will be interesting in and of themselves, but they may be even more interesting in light of the recent action that the FDIC filed against three former WaMu executives and the wives of two of the officials (about which refer here). The possibility that the WaMu securities suit settlement could involve the payment of  hundreds of millions of dollars raises the possibility that the settlement would consume the remaining limits of WaMu’s D&O insurance policy, possibly leaving the defendants in the FDIC without insurance remaining for them to defend themselves against and to try and settle the FDIC claims.

 

So The D&O Diary is interested in a number of details about the settlement, beyond just the settlement’s dollar value. We are interested to see how much of the settlement will be funded by D&O insurance, and whether any of the settlement is to be funded out of the individual defendants’ assets. We are also interested to see if the settlement documents show whether the settlement exhausts the remaining D&O insurance limits. Along the same lines, it will be interesting to see (if possible) what kind of a release the insurers are getting in exchange for the insurance payment, if any, and whether it is a policy release or just a claim release.

 

In any event, the WaMu settlement is just the first of what I think will be a wave of subprime-related securities lawsuit settlements during the course of 2011. The WaMu settlement also vividly illustrates the competition for insurance policy proceeds that the FDIC will face as it seeks to pursue lawsuits against directors and officers of failed banks, particularly as in many cases the shareholders have been actively pursuing their claims while the FDIC has proceeded much more deliberately.

 

Speakers’ Corner: On Thursday April 14, 2011, I will be a panelist at the Professional Liability Underwriting Society Southwest Chapter’s Educational Event in Englewood, Colorado. The title of the even t is “Winds of Change in Executive and Professional Liability,” and I will be speaking on panels on the topics of Governmental Investigations and D&O Liability Developments. Information about the event can be found here.

 

If you are a part of the Southwest Chapter, I hope you are planning on attending. And if you are attending I hope you will take a moment to say hello, particularly if we have never met before.

 

When the FDIC released its Quarterly Banking Profile for the fourth quarter 2010, it included a statement from FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair that the agency believes “the number of failures peaked in 2010.” However, at least through the end of February 2011, the evidence was to the contrary, as the number of bank failures during the first two months of 2011 (23), exceed the number through the end of February 2010 (22).

 

However, since the end of February 2011, the number of bank failures has declined sharply. The FDIC closed only three banks during March 2011, and only one since March 11, 2011. As of April 1, 2011, there have been a total of 26 bank failures this year. By the same point in 2010, there had been a total of 41 failed banks.

 

The difference between the two year-to-date tallies is that during March 2010, the FDIC took control of 19 banks, compared to only three in March 2011. In addition, the first Friday in April 2011 also passed without any additional bank failures.

 

The 26 bank failures through the end of March would if annualized project to about 104 bank failures by year end 2001, which would be the lowest annual number of bank failures since 2008 (when there were 25). But if the bank failure pace that prevailed in March 2011 were to continue, the number of bank failures by year end could be well below that projected number.

 

One of the signs that will be interesting to watch is the number of problem institutions reported when the FDIC releases its next Quarterly Banking Profile for the quarter ended March 31, 2011. The Profile is due to be issued sometime later in May. The number of problem institutions has been increasing every quarter for several years now, although the rate of increase has slowed. In its last profile, the FDIC stated that 2010 was a “turnaround” year for the banking industry. If last year truly was a turnaround year, the reported number of problem institutions should finally start to decline — which, if it were to happen, would tend to support the probability that the slower rate of bank failures could well continue as the year progresses.

 

With the 23 bank failures so far this year, the total number of bank failures since January 1, 2008 stands at 348. Even with this significant number of failed institutions and the amount of time that has passed since the beginning of the current bank failure wave, the FDIC has so far filed lawsuits against the directors and officers of only six failed banks. (Refer here to access a list of the FDIC lawsuits.)

 

On its website, the FDIC reports that as of March 15, 2011, it has authorized lawsuits against a total of 158 individuals. However, the six FDIC lawsuits so far collectively include only about  43 individual defendants, which suggest that there are a number of additional lawsuits being readied and likely to be filed in the near future. In addition, the number of individuals against whom lawsuits have been authorized has grown over recent months to its current level of 158, and since banks have continued to fail in the interim, it seems likely that the authorized number will continue to grow, which would imply an even greater number of lawsuits yet to come.

 

The number of lawsuits that ultimately will be filed remains to be seen. But while that part of the story unfolds, it is noteworthy that for the first time in quite a while, the story appears to be that the number of bank failures is declining. And that sure seems like a good thing to me.

 

Over the last few days, there have been a series of rulings in high-profile lawsuits arising out of the subprime meltdown and credit crisis. As discussed below, just in the past week there were dismissal motion rulings in cases involving Freddie Mac, Wachovia/Wells Fargo, and AIG. Though some or all of the claims in these cases were dismissed in whole or in part, the plaintiffs have managed to live at least for another day (if only just barely in the Freddie Mac case). At the same time,  in the AIG ERISA case, the case largely survived the dismissal motion.

 

Freddie Mac: On March 30, 2011, Southern District of New York Judge John Keenan granted without prejudice the defendants’ motion to dismiss in the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. (Freddie Mac) subprime-related securities class action lawsuit. A copy of the March 30 order can be found here.

 

Freddie Mac is of course one of the government sponsored entities that was at the center of the residential mortgage crisis in 2008. On September 7, 2008, it was placed in the hands of a conservator. In August 2008, shortly before the company entered conservatorship, the company’s public shareholders filed a securities class action lawsuit against the company and certain of its directors and officers, as discussed in greater detail here.

 

The plaintiffs alleged that in various public statements the defendants had made three types of misrepresentations or omissions: (1) about the company’s exposure to “non-prime mortgage loans”; (2) about its capital adequacy; and (3) about the strength of its due diligence and quality control mechanisms. The defendants moved to dismiss.

 

In finding that the alleged misrepresentations about the company’s exposure to subprime mortgages were insufficient, Judge Keenan found that “the Amended Complaint does not explain why Freddie Mac’s disclosures in its November 2007 Financial Reports … were insufficient to convey the truth that Freddie Mac was dealing in non-conforming mortgages to the public.” He added that “Plaintiffs present no theory at all about why Freddie Mac’s disclosures would not be understood by the reasonable investor and thus part of the ‘total mix’ of information that determined its share price.”  

 

Judge Keenan also found that the alleged misrepresentations regarding the company’s capital adequacy were also insufficient. He observed that “in a volatile economic, political and regulatory environment like the one that existed in the summer and early fall of 2008, with even Freddie Mac’s primary regulator being replaced, Plaintiffs must show more to plausibly claim that Freddie Mac’s statements were made without any basis in fact. “ However, he concluded that “Plaintiff has not adequately pleaded sufficient facts giving rise to a strong inference that Freddie Mac’s statements about its capital adequacy or its hope that it would continue to function were made with intent to defraud or without factual basis.”

 

With respect to the alleged misrepresentations regarding the company’s internal controls and processes, Judge Keenan found that “there are simply no facts in the Amended Complaint from which one could reasonably infer a causal link between Freddie Mac’s statements about its underwriting standards and internal controls and any loss suffered by purchasers of its equity securities during the Class Period.” He added that “considering that the price of Freddie Mac’s stock was clearly linked to the ‘marketwide phenomenon’ of the housing price collapse, there is decreased probability that Plaintiffs’ losses were caused by fraud.”

 

Judge Keenan granted the motions to dismiss without prejudice and allowed the plaintiffs’ 60 days in which to file a Second Amended Complaint.

 

An April 1, 2011 Bloomberg article about Judge Keenan’s decision in the Freddie Mac case can be found here.

 

Wachovia/Wells Fargo: On March 31, 2011, Southern District of New York Judge Richard Sullivan issued his rulings on the motions to dismiss in the consolidated securities litigation that had been filed on behalf former equity shareholders and bondholders of Wachovia Corporation. In a lengthy and detailed opinion (here), Judge Sullivan granted the defendants’ motions to dismiss the equity securities litigation, but he denied the motion to dismiss the bondholders’ action, other than with respect to certain bond offerings in which the plaintiffs had not actually purchased any securities.

 

As Judge Sullivan wrote in summarizing the various plaintiffs’ allegations, “all claims arise from the financial disintegration Wachovia experienced between its 2006 purchase of Golden West Financial Corporation and its 2008 merger with Wells Fargo & Company.” In essence, the complaint is based on the difficulties Wachovia experienced as a result of the Golden West “Pick-A-Pay” mortgage portfolio. Further background regarding the equity securities litigation can be found here and background regarding the bondholders’ litigation can be found here.

 

Judge Sullivan granted the defendants’ motions to dismiss the equity securities plaintiffs’ ’34 Act claims, finding that the plaintiffs had not sufficiently alleged scienter. Judge Sullivan concluded that the “more compelling inference” is that “Defendants simply did not anticipate the full extent of the mortgage crisis and the resulting implications for the Pick-A-Pay loan portfolio. Although a colossal blunder with grave consequences for many, such a failure is simply not enough to support a claim for securities fraud.” He added that “bad judgment and poor management are not fraud, even when they lead to the demise of a once venerable financial institution.”

 

Judge Sullivan also granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss the equity securities plaintiffs’ ’33 Act claims, finding that their “scattershot pleadings” failed to “afford proper notice, much less provide facially plausible factual allegations.” He added that he could not conclude “that the relevant offering documents contained material omissions in violation of affirmative disclosure obligations.”

 

However, Judge Sullivan denied the defendants’ motions to dismiss the bondholders’ ’33 Act claims (other than with respect to the offerings in which the plaintiffs had not purchased shares, with respect to which the motion was granted). In concluding that the bondholders’ allegations were sufficient when the equity securities plaintiffs’ allegations were not, Judge Sullivan found that the bondholder plaintiffs had adequately alleged misrepresentation in the relevant offering documents with respect to loan to value rations maintained in the mortgage portfolio and with respect to the alleged manipulation of the appraisal process to produce inflated appraisal values.

 

On the strength of these alleged misrepresentations in the offering documents, Judge Sullivan also denied defendant KPMG’s motion to dismiss the bondholders’ 33 Act claims.

 

Susan Beck’s April 1, 2011 Am Law Litigation Daily detailed article about Judge Sullivan’s ruling can be found here.

 

AIG ERISA Action: In a March 31, 2011 order (here) in the AIG subprime-related ERISA action, Southern District of New York Judge Laura Taylor Swain, denied the defendants’ motion to dismiss, other than with respect to plan organized on behalf of Puerto Rico employees with respect to which the motion was granted on the ground that because none of the name plaintiffs participated in that plan, they lacked standing to pursue those claims.

 

The plaintiffs are participants or beneficiaries in I two AIG plans, the AIG Incentive Savings Plan and the American General Agents’ & Managers’ Thrift Plan between June 15, 2007 and the present. Each plan offered participants a menu of investment options, one of which was the AIG Stock Fund, which invested in AIG stock.

 

The plaintiffs alleged that the defendant plan fiduciaries breached the duty of prudence by continuing to offer the AIG Stock Fund as an investment option, even when they knew or should have known that AIG stock was no longer a suitable and appropriate investment. The plaintiffs further alleged that the defendants failed to disclose to fellow fiduciaries nonpublic information that was need to protect the interests of the Plans. The plaintiffs also alleged that the defendant fiduciaries failed to monitor the investments and failed to provide complete and accurate information regarding AIG’s mismanagement and improper business practices.

 

Judge Swain rejected all of the grounds on which the defendants’ sought to dismiss the allegations asserted on behalf of participants and beneficiaries of the AIG Incentive Saving Plan and the American Genera Agents’ and Managers’ Thrift Plan. Judge Swain held that Plaintiffs had sufficiently alleged that had there been an investigation triggered by  the “warning signs” regarding problems in AIG’s Financial Products Unit, “it would have demonstrated that AIG stock had become an imprudent investment.”

 

Judge Swain also found that the Plaintiffs “have adequately alleged that Defendants failed to disclose the true extent of the risk facing AIG as a result of its financial decisions and the decline of the residential housing market, and that Defendants affirmatively misrepresented the strength and extent of the processes AIG had in place to mitigate this risk.”

 

Finally, she found that the plaintiffs “have sufficiently alleged that AIG and the director defendants were aware of the increasingly risky financial position maintained by AIG, material weaknesses in AIG’s financial health and the potential impending erosion of the value of AIG’s stock.”

 

An April 1, 2011 Bloomberg article about Judge Swain’s rulings can be found here.

 

I have in any event added these  rulings to my running tally of subprime-related lawsuit dismissal motion rulings, which can be found here.

 

Discussion

It has been quite a while since the subprime and credit crisis litigation wave first started in early 2007. Yet many of the cases are still working their way through the system. The cases discussed above involve some of the highest profile participants in many of the events surrounding the credit crisis. One thing that is striking, at least about the Freddie Mac and the Wachovia cases, is the extent to which the courts seemed influenced by the comprehensiveness of the credit crisis. It seems that in the context of a global economic crisis – particularly one that caught so many by surprise – the courts continue to be skeptical of fraud claims, absent concrete support for the allegations.

 

These rulings suggest that the barrier to overcome the initial judicial skepticism may be substantial. Indeed, the plaintiffs in the Wachovia case failed to overcome the court’s concerns despite having assembled 50 confidential witnesses, and despite the fact that the aggregate market cap drop on which the equity shareholders was approximately $109 billion.

 

On the other hand, the hurdle the plaintiffs must overcome is not insurmountable. The Wachovia bondholders’ Section 11 claims are going  forward. And even the plaintiffs in the Freddie Mac case will have at least another chance to replead to try to overcome the initial pleading hurdles.

 

Judge Swain’s ruling in the AIG ERISA case seemed more receptive. But it is worth keeping in mind that ERISA plaintiffs do not face the same heightened pleading standards that securities lawsuit plaintiffs face under the PSLRA. Perhaps even more significantly, the ERISA plaintiffs do not have to plead scienter.

 

In any event, all three of these cases will be worth watching as they continue to work their way through the system.

 

Special thanks to the loyal readers who provided me with copies of these rulings.

 

In my year-end securities litigation survey, I noted that while a number of new trends emerged during 2010, one securities lawsuit filing trend had remained constant during the year – that is, life sciences companies remained a favored securities class action lawsuit target. The heightened exposure that life sciences companies face is fully detailed in a March 2011 memo from David Kotler and Kathleen O”Connor  of the Dechert law firm entitled “Survey of Securities Fraud Class Actions Brought Against Life Sciences Companies.” A copy of the memo can be found here.

 

According to the memo, 29 different life sciences companies and their directors and officers were the subject of class action securities lawsuit filings in 2010, representing about 16.5% of all2010 securities lawsuit filings. Both the absolute filing numbers and the relative percentages of all filings are up from recent years. The 29 life sciences securities suits were up substantially from the 19 filed in 2009 (representing 10% of all securities suits that year) and from the 23% filed in 2008 (representing 10% of all securities suits).

 

It is worth noting that the count of 29 suits involving life sciences companies  does not include lawsuits involving allegations relating to mergers and acquisitions. If the merger objections suits were included, at least seven more suits would be added to the count.

 

The 2010 life sciences securities suits as a group do reflect certain distinctive characteristics. First, the 2010 lawsuits were more heavily weighted towards life sciences companies with larger market capitalizations. 28% of the 2010 lawsuits were brought against life sciences companies with market capitalizations over $10 billion, by contrast to only 5% in 2009.

 

The 2010 life sciences securities suits  also involved a significant number of lawsuits based not on such industry specific issues as FDA approvals or safety recalls. Consistent with the patterns of securities suit filings against life sciences companies in recent years, more than half of the filings involved allegations of financial improprieties, such as misstated or misleading financial reports or accounting mistakes or mismanagement.

 

To be sure, many of the 2010 did involve more industry specific allegations such as prospects or timing of FDA approval (9 of the 29 2010 lawsuits); allegations involving product efficacy (8); product safety (7); marketing practices (4); and manufacturing processes (2). Another five involved insider trading allegations.

 

The memo’s authors have been tracking the life sciences cases since 2007, and while the filings from those earlier years have not yet fully developed, there is some growing evidence to suggest that though life sciences companies may be sued more frequently than other cases, the cases may be dismissed more frequently than are cases in the larger universe of securities class action lawsuits.

 

The authors note that the SEC and the DoJ have made a priority of Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) enforcement regarding life sciences companies and in at least one case (involving SciClone Pharmaceuticals), the FCPA enforcement has resulted in a follow-on securities class action lawsuit.

 

The authors also include a discussion of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in the Matrixx Initiatives case (about which refer here). They note that “by rejecting statistical significance as setting a minimal threshold for disclosure, Matrixx will require life sciences companies to assess … disclosures and investor impact more holistically, and on a case by case basis.” The authors also note that “life sciences companies are now faced with heavily fact-specific questions of where to draw the disclosure line in the absence of a bright-line standard.”

 

The authors conclude with a number of practical suggestions for life sciences companies to take to minimize the risk of, and impact from, securities fraud class actions.

 

Share the Road: The April 2, 2011 Wall Street Journal carried a rant entitled “Dear Urban Cyclists: Go Play in the Traffic” (here), written by alleged humorist P.J. O’Rourke. O’Rourke apparently is incensed by what he perceives as the increasing preference of traffic planners for urban bicycle lanes. His essay contains a lot of statements like “ bike lanes violate fundamental principles of democracy.” Some might say that Mr. O’Rourke’s comments want proportionality.

 

My own perspective on urban cycling took a completely unexpected turn during a recent visit to London. Owing to historically unprecedented weather conditions – it was sunny and pleasant six straight days in a row while I was there – I had occasion to try out the new Barclays Bicycle Hire arrangement. The way this arrangement works is that you pay a fee for bicycle access (one pound for a single day, five pounds for a week), and then you pay a one pound an hour usage fee. (There are other arrangements for longer term users.) The best part of the arrangement is that once you have paid the access fee, you can pick up or drop off a bike at any of the numerous bike racks around the city.

 

What this means is that you can rent a bike and tool around the city without having to cycle all the way back to the place where you first rented it. You can also drop the bike off at a rack if you just want to stop and get a snack or go in a store. The first day I tried the system, I picked up a bike in Green Park and cycled all the way around Hyde Park; dropped the bike off and took the tube to Trafalgar Square  and then biked down Whitehall, past Parliament, across Lambeth Bridge to Lambeth Park; then I dropped the bike off in Vauxhall and took the tube to Regent’s Park, picked up another bike at the tennis courts there and cycled around the Park.

 

The second time I tried it, I ran a relay of bicycles all across the west end into Kensington, Notting Hill and Bayswater, stopping and starting for meals and shopping, all the while traveling through and exploring parts of the city I have never seen before.

 

According to Wikipedia (here) , there are over 5,000 bicycles and 317 docking stations available in central London. The docking stations were first installed in London in July 2010, but the heavy, three-speed bicycles themselves are already ubiquitous (particularly on kind of bright, sunshiny days I enjoyed there last week).

 

There are downsides. Among other things, the rental does not include a helmet. In addition, the left hand lane rule of the road that prevails in London led to intermittent tense moments for me, particularly with respect to other cyclists whose behavior was not always predictable. Also, it takes a certain kind of courage to try to ride a bike through, say, Piccadilly Circus.

 

All of those concerns notwithstanding, I have to say that I found this bicycle hire scheme absolutely marvelous. One of the docking stations is located just outside the hotel I favor when I visit London, and now that I am comfortable with the scheme, I intend to take advantage of the arrangement on future visits. It is a convenient and enjoyable way to get around the city.

 

As for Mr. O’Rourke and his dyspeptic vision of urban bicycling, I can only surmise that he had not given the new London bicycle hire arrangement a chance. I think a cruise around Hyde Park on a sunny afternoon would do him a world of good, and might entirely alter his views about urban bicycling and democracy.

 

With four more securities suits involving Chinese or China-linked companies this past Friday, the phenomenon of securities class action lawsuits against these firms has emerged as one of the most distinct securities litigation trends so far this year. The filing trend actually first emerged in the second half of 2010, but it has continued into 2011 and appears to have gained significant momentum in recent weeks following recent revelations of accounting irregularities involving Chinese companies.

 

The four latest suits involving Chinese-linked companies are as follows:

 

1. China Electric Motor, Inc.: According to their April 1, 2011 press release (here), plaintiffs’ lawyers have initiated a securities class action lawsuit in the Central District of California against China Electric Motor, a Delaware corporation with its principle place of business in China, as well as the certain of its directors and officers and the underwriters who underwrote the company’s January 29, 2010 IPO.

 

According to the Complaint (here), the lawsuit follows the company’s March 31, 2011 announcement that it is forming a special committee to investigate accounting discrepancies “concerning the Company’s banking statements” identified by the company’s auditors. The company has delayed release of its fourth quarter and year end financial statements and trading in the company’s securities has been halted.

 

2. Advanced Battery Technologies, Inc.: In their April 1, 2011 press release (here), the plaintiffs’ lawyers state that they have filed a securities class action lawsuit in the Southern District of New York against Advanced Battery and certain of its directors and officers. According to the complaint (here), the company is a Delaware corporation with offices in New York that, through subsidiaries, owns two Chinese operating companies.

 

The complaint alleges that the company made misleading statements about its ownership interests in certain Chinese operating companies and that it failed to disclose or fully disclose certain related party transactions involving the company’s CEO. The complaint also alleges, relying heavily on a securities analyst’s report , that the company made false statements about its supposed investment in a company that may not even exist.

 

3. China Intelligent Lighting and Electronics, Inc.: According to the their April 1, 2011 press release (here), plaintiffs’ attorneys have filed a complaint in the Central District of California against the company, certain of its directors and officer and the investment banks that underwrote the company’s June 18, 2010. (One of the investment banks, Westpark Capital, was also involved in the China Electric IPO described above.) The company is a Delaware Corporation with its principle place of business in China. A copy of the complaint can be found here.

 

The lawsuit follows the company’s March 29, 2011 press release in which it announced the termination of its auditor, MaloneBailey LLP; its auditor’s resignation and withdrawal of the audit opinion it issued in connection with the prior year end financial statement; and the formation of a special investigation committee. The press release also discloses that the SEC has launched a formal investigation of t he company.

 

In the press release, the company also discloses that MaloneBailey resigned “due to accounting fraud involving forging of the Company’s accounting records and forging bank records.” The auditors also allegedly stated that the “accounting records at the company have been falsified.” 

 

4. China Century Dragon Media: According to their April 1, 2011 press release (here), plaintiffs lawyers have filed a securities class action lawsuit against the company, certain of its directors and officers and against its offering underwriters. Among the offering underwriters named as defendant in the case is the Wespark Capital firm, which was involved in the China Electric Motor and China Advanced Lighting offerings described above. A copy of the complaint, which was filed in the Central District of California, can be found here.

 

The China Century Dragon Media lawsuit follows the company’s March 28, 2011 announcement of the resignation of its auditor, MaloneBailey LLP (the same firm as withdrew from auditing China Intelligent Lighting, as noted above), and the firm’s withdrawal of its prior audit opinions. The press release discloses that the auditor has resigned as a result of “irregularities” that may indicate that the company’s “accounting records have been falsified.” The discrepancies could also indicate material errors in the company’s prior financial statements. The company also disclosed that its shares have been delisted and the SEC has commenced a formal investigation.

 

These four new lawsuits join the seven suits that had previously been filed so far in 2011 against Chinese and China-linked companies. Of these eleven total lawsuits, six have been filed just since March 18, 2011. The eleven suits against Chinese-related firms already exceed the ten lawsuits that were filed against Chinese companies in 2010. Signs are that there may be further suits to follow shortly, as the law firm that filed all four of the above described lawsuits issued an April 1, 2011 press release (here) that it is investigating possible securities law violations involving Keyuan Petrochemicals (a Nevada corporation with its principal place of business in China), following the company’s April 1, 2011 announcement that it was delaying filing its year end financial statements and initiating an audit committee investigation of certain “concerns.” 

 

The rash of lawsuits has arisen at the same time that the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board raised concerns in a March 14, 2011 report (here) about accounting and auditing standards at Chinese companies that have conducted IPOs in the U.S. or that have become U.S. publicly traded companies through reverse mergers. The report identifies a number of factors that may undermine the ability of audit firms to complete their audit functions completely or effectively. In light of the concerns in the PCAOB report, it hardly comes as a surprise that accounting concerns are coming to light in connection with some of these Chinese firms.

 

The allegations raised in these cases, like the allegations in the four cases described in detail above, fall into two basic categories: Inadequate disclosures involved related-party transactions (see especially Tongxin [here], China Valves Technology [here], and China Integrated Energy [here]), and accounting irregularities or accounting improprieties (see especially China Media Express [here], China AgriTech [here], ShegndaTech [here] and NIVS Intellimedia Technology Group [here].

 

Another familiar theme running through at least a few of these cases is that the lawsuits followed the resignation of the MaloneBailey firm as the defendant company’s auditors. The audit firm’s resignation preceded the lawsuits filed against NVIS Intellimedia Technology Group, China Intelligent Lighting and Electronics, and China Century Dragon Media.  MaloneBailey is identified in Table 8 of the PCAOB report as the U.S.-based firm with the most Chinese reverse merger company clients. In addition, a number of the companies named as defendants in these suits conducted offerings with the investment bank Westpark Capital, Inc as one of their offering underwriters.

 

These firms’ involvement may well be purely coincidental. The larger pattern is that there seems to be a growing number of Chinese and China-linked companies that are announcing concerns related to the accounting and reported financial statements. Whether these issues will continue to emerge will remain to be seen. But for now, a securities litigation filing trend that first developed in the second half of 2008 seems to be going strong as we head into the second quarter of 2011. 

 

Largely as a result of a flood of M&A related lawsuits, there were a significant number of new securities class action lawsuits filed in the first quarter of 2011, and even factoring out the M&A lawsuits, the first three months of the year still represented an active period for securities lawsuit filings.

 

Taking the merger objection suits into account, there were a total of 55 new securities class action lawsuits filed in the first quarter. That would imply an annualized rate of 220 securities suits for the year, which would be well above both the 176 filed in 2010 and the 1996-2009 annual average of 195 filings. However, the rash of merger suits filed during the first quarter does complicate the numeric analysis, as the changing mix of cases may make the year to year measures somewhat of an apples- to-oranges comparison.

 

There were 20 federal court merger objection lawsuits in the first quarter. (There were even more state court merger objection lawsuits, as discussed further below.)  Subtracting the federal court merger objection lawsuits from the first quarter securities class action lawsuit filing tally would reduce the number of first quarter filings from 55 to 35, which would be idenitcal to the 35 new securities suits filed in the first quarter of 2010. Obviously, the process of determining what to include in the lawsuit count has a huge impact on the ultimate tally.  I have further observations about “counting” the securities suit filings below.

 

The 55 securities suits in the first quarter represent a surprisingly diverse range of kinds of companies. The companies targeted in the 55 suits represent 42 different Standard Industrial Classification (SIC  Code categories. Only two SIC Code categories had as many as three companies sued – SIC Code Category 2834 (Pharmaceutical Preparations) and SIC Code Category 3674 (Semiconductors and Related Devices.).

 

By interesting contrast to recent years’ filing patterns, the first quarter filings included relatively few companies in the 6000 SIC Code group (Finance, Insurance and Real Estate). While the credit crisis litigation wave was unfolding and lawsuits against financial companies flooded in, suits against companies in the 6000 SIC Code group predominated. The relative decline of litigation activity in this category provides even further proof that the credit crisis related litigation wave has largely played out. I count a total of only three cases in the first quarter that might even arguably be categorized as credit crisis related. Among these three were  two new securities suits in the first quarter involving failed or troubled banks, which is a filing phenomenon that seems likely to continue in the weeks and months ahead.

 

Among the 55 first quarter cases were nine suits filed against companies domiciled outside the United States. In addition to these nine, there were two additional companies sued that were incorporated in the United States but that have their principle place of business outside the U.S. These eleven total cases represent about 16.3% of all first quarter filings, a percentage that is above the approximately 12% of 2010 filings that involved non-U.S. companies. This relative increase in the incidence of filings against non-U.S. companies is frankly unexpected in light of the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 2010 decision in Morrison v. National Australia Bank (about which refer here).

 

The persistent elevated level of filings against non-U.S. companies is largely attributable to the surge in lawsuits involving Chinese companies. Four of the nine lawsuits filed in the first quarter against non-U.S. companies were filed against Chinese companies. Three additional lawsuits involved companies incorporated elsewhere but with their principle places of business in China. These seven suits together represent about 12.7% of all first quarter filings. Indications are that this phenomenon of suits involving Chinese companies is likely to continue, as in recent days, plaintiffs’ lawyers have issued numerous press releases (for example, here and here)  indicating that they  are “investigating” certain other Chinese companies (a development that usually presages a subsequent lawsuit filing.)

 

As the new filings have shifted away from financially related companies, the jurisdictions in which lawsuit filings have been concentrated have also shifted. During the credit crisis litigation wave, lawsuit filings were concentrated in the Southern District of New York. Indeed, there were nine new securities suit filings in the Southern District of New York during the first quarter 2011, but for the first time since 2007 there were more quarterly filings in a federal district other than the Southern District of New York. Specifically, there were ten new securities lawsuit filings in the Central District of California, and another five in the Northern District of California, a changing jurisdictional mix that reflects the shifting mix of companies that are getting sued.

 

More About the Merger Objection Lawsuits: As I noted above, there were twenty new federal court merger objection lawsuits filed during the first quarter of 2011. A total of at least 63 different M&A transactions produced merger objection litigation in the first quarter, but many of the lawsuits relating to these transactions were filed in state court rather than in federal court. In addition, some of the transactions provoked lawsuits in both state and federal court, and some provoked multiple different lawsuits in different states.

 

Breaking all of this M&A related litigation down, and counting both the state and federal merger objection lawsuits,  there were a total of at least 81 different lawsuits relating to at least 63 different transactions. OF these 81 lawsuits, 20 were filed in federal court and 61 were filed in state court. As indicated above, some transactions produced multiple lawsuits in different jurisdictions.

 

A Note About Counting: Some readers may note that my count of 55 first quarter securities lawsuits differs substantially that the 39 lawsuits reported as of today on the Stanford Law School Securities Class Action Clearinghouse website. There are two reasons for this difference. One is timing, as I have counted suits that have not yet made it onto the Stanford site’s list. The other is counting protocol, as I have included 11 federal merger objection suits on my list that are not included on the Stanford website list.

 

As I have noted numerous times in the past on this site, one of the most challenging parts about keeping a running tally of securities class action lawsuit filings is deciding what you are going to count. As part of my counting protocol used during the first quarter, I have chosen to “count” all federal court securities suits, including all merger objection suits. This has produced a count that differs in certain particulars from the Stanford website count. However, I should hasten to add that my count includes all of the cases noted on the Stanford site. It just includes a few more.

 

These differences underscored the importance of definitional consistency when making comparisons across time. The comparisons are only meaningful if the counting protocols are consistent over time.

 

Finally, and whatever else might be said about the increasing numbers of merger related lawsuits, it seems apparent that the mix of cases is decidedly shifting. While there may be fewer traditional securities class action lawsuits being filed than in some prior years, the amount of total litigation activity is at or above historical averages when the merger objection litigation is taken in to account. And it also seems to be the case that at least as a matter of percentages of all filings, the merger objection lawsuits now outweigh the tradtional securities class action lawsuits.

 

On March 30, 2011, the U.K. Ministry of Justice released its long-awaited Guidance with respect to The Bribery Act of 2010, detailing the Act’s scope and jurisdictional applicability. The Guidance, which can be found here,  has quickly been criticized in some quarters for “watering down” the Act, particularly with respect to the jurisdictional scope of the Act’s commercial bribery provisions. The Serious Fraud Office’s prosecution guidance, also released on March 30, 2011, can be found here.

 

From the time the Act received Royal Assent, one of its features that has been the focus of particular concern has been Section 7 of the Act. Section 7 creates a new offense which can be committed by commercial organizations that fail to prevent persons associated with them from committing bribery on their behalf. Commentators have been concerned that this provision seemingly would subject any firm –even non-U.K. companies that have operations in the U.K. – to liability under the Act for violative conduct taking place any where in the world.

 

The newly-issued Guidance proposes a “common sense” approach to the question of applicability of this provision to firms organized outside the United Kingdom. While noting that ultimately the courts will determine whether or not a firm has a sufficient U.K. presence to warrant the Act’s application, the document goes on to say that the Act would not apply to firms that “do not have a demonstrable business presence” in the U.K.

 

As an example of the kinds of activities that would not be sufficient to constitute the carrying on of business in the U.K., the document states that “the mere fact that a company’s securities have been admitted to the U.K. Listing Authority and therefore admitted to trading on the London Stock Exchange” is not sufficient “to qualify that company as carrying on a business or part of a business in the U.K.

 

The document further specifies that merely “having a U.K. subsidiary will not, in itself, mean that a parent company is carrying on a business in the U.K.,” as “a subsidiary may act independently of its parent or other group companies.”

 

The primary thrust of the Guidance document is to identify procedures that companies can put in place to take advantage of the defense available under the Act, which provides that a firm cannot be held liable under the Act if it has adequate procedures in place to prevent persons associate with it from bribing.

 

 The document describes a principles based rather than a rules based framework, built around six guiding principles. The six principles are: proportionate procedures; top-level commitment; risk assessment; due diligence; communication; and monitoring and review.

 

The document also provides clarification about hospitality, stating  that “bona fide hospitality and promotional expenditures” are an “an established and important part of doing business” adding that “it is not the intention of the Act to criminalize such behavior.” The document specifically cites as example of such payments that would not typically run afoul of the Act’s provisions as “the provision of airport to hotel transfer services to facilitate an on-site visit or dining and tickets to an event.”  Introductory comments in the document from the Secretary of the State for Justice Kenneth Clarke add that “no one wants to stop firms from getting to know their clients by taking them to events like Wimbledon or the Grand Prix.”

 

The Act will now come in to force on July 1, 2011. The provisions in the Guidance document have been welcomed by some commentators, who note that the proportionate approach reflect in the document should be “good for business.” At the same time other commentators have criticized the guidance as having introduced “loopholes.”  Others have criticized the government for “watering down” the Act’s provisions.  

 

My own view is that while the Guidance has provided some clarification, it has not provided absolute clarity either, and the lack of clarity remains a concern. The examples given about what kind of activity would not be sufficient to support liability under the Act are helpful as far as they go, particularly that merely having a U.K. listing or a U.K. sub is not enough to support liability against a listed firm or the sub’s parent. Those activities are not sufficient, but what level of activity is sufficient?

 

The clarification that the government will be pragmatic and that the government will be guided by principles of proportionality is reassuring. However, the government’s Guidance document does not by any means put to rest all concerns. The upcoming applicability of the Bribery Act should remain an issue of focus and concern for companies with a business presence in the U.K I worry about the first non-U.K. company whose activities will become the test case under the Act.

 

In a March 29, 2011 order (here), Southern District of New York Judge Jed Rakoff granted the defendants’ motions to dismiss a pair of subprime-related derivative lawsuits that had been brought against certain directors and officers of Merrill Lynch. Because the plaintiffs — former shareholders of Merrill Lynch who became BofA shareholders at the time of BofA’s January 2009 acquisition of Merrill—asserted their claims in the capacities as BofA shareholders, both lawsuits represented so-called double derivative suits. A copy of Judge Rakoff’s March 29 ruling can be found here.

 

Judge Rakoff granted the motions to dismiss because he concluded that the plaintiffs had failed to show that BofA’s board was” so involved in the underlying wrongdoing alleged in the derivative complaint that it could not impartially consider a demand to pursue claims against the Merrill officers and directors.”

 

Both lawsuits sought to assert claims against the defendants for the “unprecedented losses” Merrill had experienced “as a result of its aggressive investment in collateralized debt obligations.” A detailed review of the underlying facts can be found here. In an earlier ruling, Judge Rakoff had previously ruled that the plaintiffs lacked standing to assert derivative claims on Merrill’s behalf because they were no longer Merrill shareholders. His prior ruling was without prejudice to their refilling their claims in their capacities as BofA shareholders.

 

The plaintiffs refilled their complaints seeking to compel BofA’s board to force its Merrill subsidiary to bring claims against certain Merrill directors and officers in connection with Merrill’s reckless investments. The key difference in the two actions is that in the first action (referred to as the “Derivative Action”), the plaintiffs allege that they are not required to bring a demand that BofA’s board bring the action against the Merrill officials, whereas in the second action (the “Lambrecht Action”), the plaintiffs had presented a demand which the BofA board had refused.

 

Judge Rakoff concluded that both actions should be dismissed, noting that

 

The Court does not take this step lightly, for the allegations of the complaint, if true, describe the kind of risky behavior by high-ranking financiers that helped created the economic crisis from which so many Americans continue to suffer. But a derivative action is brought for the benefit of the company, and nothing here alleged in the complaints raises a reason to doubt that the board of the relevant company, BofA, was at all times fairly positioned to determine whether bringing an action against Merrill’s former directors and officers was in the company’s interests.

 

With respect to the Derivative Action, Judge Rakoff specifically concluded that the plaintiffs had “failed to make a legally adequate showing” that the BofA board was so involved in the underlying wrongdoing “that it could not impartially consider a demand to pursue claims against the Merrill officers and directors.”

 

With respect to the Lambrecht Action, Judger Rakoff concluded that the plaintiffs had “failed to carry the considerable burden of showing that the BofA’s Board’s decision not to bring a lawsuit against the Merrill officers and directors was made in bad faith or was based on an unreasonable investigation.”  

 

Discussion

Some time ago, as discussed here, Merrill Lynch settled for $475 million dollars the related securities class action lawsuit that had been filed on behalf of Merrill’s shareholder. Merrill also at the same time agreed to settle the related ERISA liability suit for an additional $75 million. In addition, Merrill agreed to settle the related securities suit that had been brought by its bondholders for $150 million, as discussed here. These settlements represent $700 million in aggregate.

 

However, Merrill and its successor in interest BofA declined to settle the related derivative litigation, and Judge Rakoff’s decision dismissing the derivative litigation appears to vindicate that decision.

 

Judge Rakoff’s ruling is interesting if for no other reason that the unusual posture of the double derivative suit, where the demand to pursue the claims against the former directors and officers of a subsidiary must be directed against the board of the parent company.

 

The ruling is also interesting because it illustrates just how difficult it is to overcome the initial pleading hurdles in a derivative suit. Judge Rakoff concluded that the initial pleading requirements had not been satisfied notwithstanding allegations that Judge Rakoff himself said “describe the kind of risky behavior by high-ranking financiers that helped create the economic crisis from which so many Americans continue to suffer. “ The clear implication is that even allegations of egregious behavior will not suffice if the demand requirements have not been satisfied or proved inapplicable.

 

Judge Rakoff’s analysis of the BofA board’s rejection of the Lambrecht plaintiffs’ suit demand is particularly interesting. In reviewing the substance of the reasons the BofA board gave for rejecting the demand, Judge Rakoff noted that the rejection letter the board had sent “belies plaintiff’s assertions” that the rejection was cursory and the letter itself mere boilerplate. In support of this conclusion, he noted that the board had reasoned that taking up the litigation as the Lambrecht plaintiffs demanded would have undermined Merrill’s defenses in the securities litigation and in the ERISA litigation. The letter also reflected the board’s conclusion that the cost of the urged litigation might well any benefit that might reasonably be expected. These types of considerations often are present when these types of demands are presented to boards, and Judge Rakoff’s analysis seems to confirm that it these kinds of considerations are appropriate for boards to take into account in rejecting litigation demands.

 

Finally, Judge Rakoff rejected the plaintiffs suggestions that the response letter irself showed that consideration of the litigation demand was cursory, noting that” there is no prescribed procedure a board must follow in responding to a demand letter.”

 

I have in any event added the ruling to my running tally of subprime-related dismissal motions rulings, which can be accessed here.

 

Nate Raymond’s March 29, 2011 Am Law Litigation Daily article about Judge Rakoff’s decision can be found here.

 

Special thanks to the securities litigation group at Skadden for forwarding me a copy of Judge Rakoff’s ruling. Skadden represented Bank of America and Merrill Lynch in the two derivative suits.

 

An International D&O Resource. I know from conversations with readers that one issue of recurring concern is finding resources on which to rely in connection with the non-U.S. exposures of directors and officers. With that concern in mind, I am pleased to link here to the recently completed paper by my friend Perry Granof. The paper, which is entitled “The Top 10 Non-US-Jurisdictions Based Upon Maturity and Activity” (here) analyzes the ten non-U.S. jurisdictions that Perry believes have the most evolved systems with respect to the liabilities of directors and officers. The list also includes three ‘up-and-coming” jurisdictions, as well.